Ligand discovery for t cell receptors

ABSTRACT

Compositions and methods are provided for the identification of peptide sequences that are ligands for a T cell receptor (TCR) of interest, in a given MHC context.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

T cells are the central mediators of adaptive immunity, through bothdirect effector functions and coordination and activation of otherimmune cells. Each T cell expresses a unique T cell receptor (TCR),selected for the ability to bind to major histocompatibility complex(MHC) molecules presenting peptides. TCR recognition of peptide-MHC(pMHC) drives T cell development, survival, and effector functions. Eventhough TCR ligands are relatively low affinity (1-100 μM), the TCRs areremarkably sensitive, requiring as few as 10 agonist peptides to fullyactivate a T cell.

Extensive structural studies of TCR recognition of pMHC show the vastmajority of studied TCR-pMHC complexes share a consistent bindingorientation, driven by conserved contacts between the tops of the MHChelices and the germline-encoded TCR CDR1 and CDR2 loops (see Garcia andAdams (2005) Cell 122, 333-336; Garcia et al. (2009) Nat Immunol 10,143-147; and Rudolph et al. (2006) Annual Review of Immunology 24,419-466). These conserved contacts have likely coevolved throughout thedevelopment of the adaptive immune system and serve as the basis of MHCrestriction of the as TCR repertoire (Scott-Browne et al., 2011).Alteration to the typical TCR-pMHC interaction has been shown tocorrelate with abrogated signaling and, when present in development,skewed TCR repertoires (Adams et al. (2011) Immunity 35(5):681-93;Birnbaum et al. (2012) Immunol. Rev. 250(1):82-101).

An additional important feature of the TCR is the ability to balancecross-reactivity with specificity. Since the number of T cells thatwould be necessary to uniquely recognize every possible pMHC combinationis extremely high, and since there are few if any ‘holes’ characterizedin the TCR repertoire, it has been posited that a large degree of TCRcross-reactivity is a requirement of functional antigen recognition. Howthe T cell repertoire can simultaneously be MHC restricted,cross-reactive enough to ensure all potential antigenic challenges canbe met, yet still specific enough to avoid aberrant autoimmunity, hasremained an open and pressing question in immunology.

The present invention provides materials and methods for theidentification of T cell receptor ligands.

Related Publications

U.S. Pat. No. 8,450,247, Peelle et al.; Patent Application Publication;Pub. No. US 2010/0210473, Bowley et al.; US 2004/0146976, Dane et al.;International Application WO2004015395; International ApplicationWO2005116646; International Application WO2012022975.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Compositions and methods are provided for the identification of peptidesequences that are ligands for a T cell receptor (TCR) of interest, in agiven MHC context. In the methods of the invention, a library of singlechain polypeptides are generated that comprise: the binding domains of amajor histocompatibility complex protein; and diverse peptide ligands.The library is initially generated as a population of polynucleotidesencoding the single chain polypeptide operably linked to an expressionvector, which library may comprise at least 10⁶, at least 10⁷, moreusually at least 10⁸ different peptide ligand coding sequences, and maycontain up to about 10¹³, 10¹⁴ or more different ligand sequences. Thelibrary is introduced into a suitable host cell that expresses theencoded polypeptide, which host cells include, without limitation, yeastcells. The number of unique host cells expressing the polypeptide isgenerally less than the total predicted diversity of polynucleotides,e.g. up to about 5×10⁹ different specificities, up to about 10⁹, up toabout 5×10⁸, up to about 10⁸, etc.

A TCR of interest is multimerized to enhance binding, and used to selectfor host cells expressing those single chain polypeptides that bind tothe T cell receptor. Iterative rounds of selection are performed, i.e.the cells that are selected in the first round provide the startingpopulation for the second round, etc. until the selected population hasa signal above background, usually at least three and more usually atleast four rounds of selection are performed. Polynucleotides encodingthe final selected population from the library of single chainpolypeptides are subjected to high throughput sequencing. It is shownherein that the selected set of peptide ligands exhibit a restrictedchoice of amino acids at residues, e.g. the residues that contact theTCR, which information can be input into an algorithm that can be usedto analyze public databases for all peptides that meet the criteria forbinding, and which provides a set of peptides that meet these criteria.

The peptide ligand is from about 8 to about 20 amino acids in length,usually from about 8 to about 18 amino acids, from about 8 to about 16amino acids, from about 8 to about 14 amino acids, from about 8 to about12 amino acids, from about 10 to about 14 amino acids, from about 10 toabout 12 amino acids. It will be appreciated that a fully random librarywould represent an extraordinary number of possible combinations. Inpreferred methods, the diversity is limited at the residues that anchorthe peptide to the MHC binding domains, which are referred to herein asMHC anchor residues. The position of the anchor residues in the peptideare determined by the specific MHC binding domains. Class I bindingdomains have anchor residues at the P2 position, and at the last contactresidue. Class II binding domains have an anchor residue at P1, anddepending on the allele, at one of P4, P6 or P9. For example, the anchorresidues for IE^(k) are P1 {I,L,V} and P9 {K}; the anchor residues forHLA-DR15 are P1 {I,L,V} and P4 {F, Y}. Anchor residues for DR allelesare shared at P1, with allele-specific anchor residues at P4, P6, P7,and/or P9.

In some embodiments, the binding domains of a major histocompatibilitycomplex protein are soluble domains of Class II alpha and beta chain. Insome such embodiments the binding domains have been subjected tomutagenesis and selected for amino acid changes that enhance thesolubility of the single chain polypeptide, without altering the peptidebinding contacts. In certain specific embodiments, the binding domainsare HLA-DR4a comprising the set of amino acid changes {M36L, V132M}; andHLA-DR4p comprising the set of amino acid changes {H62N, D72E}. Incertain specific embodiments, the binding domains are HLA-DR15acomprising the set of amino acid changes {F12S, M23K}; and HLA-DR15pcomprising the amino acid change {P11S}. In certain specificembodiments, the binding domains are H2 IE^(k)α comprising the set ofamino acid changes {I8T, F12S, L14T, A56V} and H2 IE^(k)β comprising theset of amino acid changes {W6S, L8T, L34S}.

In some embodiments, the binding domains of a major histocompatibilitycomplex protein comprise the alpha 1 and alpha 2 domains of a Class IMHC protein, which are provided in a single chain with β2 microglobulin.In some such embodiments the Class I protein has been subjected tomutagenesis and selected for amino acid changes that enhance thesolubility of the single chain polypeptide, without altering the peptidebinding contacts. In certain specific embodiments, the binding domainsare HLA-A2 alpha 1 and alpha 2 domains, comprising the amino acid change{Y84A}. In certain specific embodiments, the binding domains areH2-L^(d) alpha 1 and alpha 2 domains, comprising the amino acid change{M31R}. In certain specific embodiments the binding domains are HLA-B57alpha 1, alpha 2 and alpha 3 domains, comprising the amino acid change{Y84A}.

In some embodiments of the invention, a library is provided ofpolypeptides, or of nucleic acids encoding such polypeptides, whereinthe polypeptide structure has the formula:

P-L-β-L₂-α-L₃-T

wherein each of L₁, L₂ and L₃ are flexible linkers of from about 4 toabout 12 amino acids in length, e.g. comprising glycine, serine,alanine, etc.

α is a soluble form of a domains of a class I MHC protein, or class II aMHC protein;

β is a soluble form of (i) a β chain of a class II MHC protein or (ii)β₂ microglobulin for a class I MHC protein;

T is a domain that allows the polypeptide to be tethered to a cellsurface, including without limitation yeast Aga2, or is a transmembranedomain that allows display on a cell surface; and

P is a peptide ligand, usually a library of different peptide ligands asdescribed above, where at least 10⁶, at least 10⁷, more usually at least10⁸ different peptide ligands are present in the library. The MHCbinding domains are as described above. The library can be provided as anucleic acid composition, e.g. operably linked to an expression vector.The library can be provided as a population of host cells transfectedwith the nucleic acid composition. In some embodiments the host cellsare yeast (S. cerevisae) cells. The MHC portion of the construct may bea “mini” MHC where the boundaries for inclusion of the protein are setto be the end of the MHC peptide binding domain; or may be set at theend of the Beta2/Alpha2/Alpha3 domains as judged by structure and/orsequence for the ‘full length’ MHCs.

The multimerized T cell receptor for selection is a soluble proteincomprising the binding domains of a TCR of interest, e.g. TCRα/β,TCRγ/δ, and can be synthesized by any convenient method. The TCR can beprovided as a single chain, or a heterodimer. In some embodiments, thesoluble TCR is modified by the addition of a biotin acceptor peptidesequence at the C terminus of one polypeptide. After biotinylation atthe acceptor peptide, the TCR can be multimerized by binding to biotinbinding partner, e.g. avidin, streptavidin, traptavidin, neutravidin,etc. The biotin binding partner can comprise a detectable label, e.g. afluorophore, mass label, etc., or can be bound to a particle, e.g. aparamagnetic particle. Selection of ligands bound to the TCR can beperformed by flow cytometry, magnetic selection, and the like as knownin the art.

Also provided herein is a method of determining the set of polypeptideligands that bind to a T cell receptor of interest, comprising the stepsof: performing multiple rounds of selection of a polypeptide library asset forth herein with a T cell receptor of interest; performing deepsequencing of the peptide ligands that are selected; inputting thesequence data to computer readable medium, where it is used to generatea search algorithm embodied as a program of instructions executable bycomputer and performed by means of software components loaded into thecomputer.

Also provided herein are software products tangibly embodied in amachine-readable medium, the software product comprising instructionsoperable to cause one or more data processing apparatus to performoperations comprising: generating a n×20 matrix from the positionalfrequencies of selected peptide ligands obtained by the screeningmethods of the invention, where n is the number of amino acid positionsin the peptide ligand library. A cutoff of amino acid frequencies isset, e.g. less than 0.1, less than 0.05, less than 0.01, and frequenciesbelow the cutoff are set to zero. A database of sequences, e.g. a set ofhuman polypeptide sequences; a set of pathogen polypeptide sequences, aset of microbial polypeptide sequences, a set of allergen polypeptidesequences; etc. are searched with the algorithm using an n-positionsliding window alignment with scoring the product of positional aminoacid frequencies from the substitution matrix. An aligned segmentcontaining at least one amino acid where the frequency is below thecutoff is excluded as a match.

In some embodiments, a kit is provided for the identification of peptidesequences that are ligands for a T cell receptor (TCR) of interest. Sucha kit may comprise a library of polynucleotides encoding a polypeptideof the formula P-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T, where a diverse set of peptide ligandsis provided, e.g. at least 10⁶, at least 10⁷, more usually at least 10⁸,at least 10⁹, at least 10¹⁰ different peptide ligands are present in thelibrary and may contain up to about 10¹⁴ different ligands, usually upto about 10¹³ different ligands. The polynucleotide library can beprovided as a population of transfected cells, or as an isolatedpopulation of nucleic acids. Reagents for labeling and multimerizing aTCR can be included. In some embodiments the kit will further comprise asoftware package for analysis of a sequence database.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The invention is best understood from the following detailed descriptionwhen read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. It isemphasized that, according to common practice, the various features ofthe drawings are not to-scale. On the contrary, the dimensions of thevarious features are arbitrarily expanded or reduced for clarity.Included in the drawings are the following figures.

FIG. 1: Library design and selection of I-E^(k), a murine class II MHCmolecule. (A) Schematic of the murine class II MHC I-E^(k) displayed onyeast, as β1α1 ‘mini’ MHC with peptide covalently linked to MHCN-terminus. (B) Mutations required for correct folding of the β1α1‘mini’ I-E^(k) (top). Mutations found via error prone mutagenesis andselection are colored purple. Rationally introduced mutations arecolored red. Staining with 2B4 and 226 tetramers demonstrate function oferror prone-only construct (1^(st) gen MHC) as well as errorprone+designed mutant construct (2nd gen MHC) (bottom). (C) Design ofthe peptide library displayed by I-E^(k). Design is based upon thestructure of 2B4 bound to MCC/I-E^(k) (left). Residues from P(−2) to P10are randomized, with limited diversity at P(−2), P10, and the P1/P9anchors (right). Residues are colored corresponding to TCR contacts(magenta), MHC contacts (brown), MHC anchors (black), or neutralcontacts (grey). (D) TCR tetramer staining of three clones selected forbinding to 2B4 TCR compared to MCC (wild-type). TCR contacts are coloredred. See also FIG. 8.

FIG. 2: Deep sequencing of peptide selections on I-E^(k) converges onone dominant epitope for 2B4 TCR recognition. (A) Plots for amino acidprevalence at the three primary TCR contact positions (P3 (cyan), P5(magenta), and P8 (orange)) show the peptide library enriches from evenrepresentation of all amino acids in the pre-selection library to aWT-like motif at each position. A secondary preference can be seen at P5and P8 in round 3 but is outcompeted by round 4. (B) Sequence enrichmentof 250 most abundant peptides show a convergence from a broad array ofsequences to a few related clones. Area in grey represents all clonesother than the most prevalent 250. (C) Comparison of total number ofpeptides and prevalence of 10 most abundant peptides for each round ofselection. See also FIG. 9.

FIG. 3: Three different MCC/I-E^(k) reactive TCRs require a WT-likerecognition motif in the peptide antigens. (A) Heatmaps of amino acidpreference by position for 2B4 (left, red) 5cc7 (center, green) and 226(right, blue) TCRs. The sequence for MCC is represented via outlinedboxes. TCR contact residues are labeled red on x axis. (B) Covariationanalysis of TCR contact positions P5 (x axis) and P8 (y axis) showdistinct coupling of amino acid preferences. (C) Minimum distanceclustering of all TCR sequences selected above background show sequencesfor all TCRs form one large cluster with MCC (black circle, notrepresented in library but added for reference). Sequence cluster placedin a representation of whole-library sequence space (left: 1×magnification, center: 1000× magnification) for reference. See also FIG.10.

FIG. 4: Relationships between affinity and activity of peptides selectedfor binding to IE^(k)-reactive TCRs. (A) EC50s of IL-2 release and CD69upregulation for 2B4 T cells with either peptides selected from library,plus MCC (red) (left), or peptides selected for a TCR other than the onetested (right). Sequences with close homology to MCC are represented inblue. Sequences that do not share 3/3 TCR contacts with MCC are inblack. (B) EC50s as in A, but for 5cc7 T cells. (C) Correlation betweenpMHC-TCR affinity and peptide signaling potency. Each data pointrepresents one peptide. See also FIG. 11.

FIG. 5: Peptides distantly related to MCC show highly similar mechanismof recognition and linkages to the cognate antigen. Crystal structuresof peptide-MHC/TCR complexes for 2A-I-E^(k)/2B4 and MCC-I-E^(k)/2B4 (PDBID: 3QIB) (A) as well as 5c1-I-Ek/5cc7 and MCC-1-E^(k)/226 (PDB ID:3QIU) (B) compared. TCR contacts are shown in magenta (noted withtriangles). Each structure aligned based on MHC (top) shows very littlechange in overall binding geometry despite significant variation ofpeptide sequence. The TCRs accommodate differences in peptide sequenceprimarily through rearrangement of the TCR CDR3β (bottom). (C) TCR CDRloop footprints for 2B4 recognizing MCC and 2A peptides, 226 recognizingMCC and MCC K99E peptides, and 5cc7 recognizing 5c1 and 5c2 peptide showvery little deviation. (D) Progression of sequences from MCC and 2Apeptides. Each peptide is represented in deep sequencing results anddiffers by one TCR contact from the previous sequence. See also Table 1.

FIG. 6: Design and selection of HLA-DR15 based libraries for myelinbasic protein (MBP)-reactive human TCRs. (A) HLA-DR15 library designbased upon structure of MBP-HLA-DR15/Ob.1A12 complex crystal structure(PDB ID:1YMM). All residues (P(−4)-P10) are fully randomized, except forthe P1 and P4 anchors (in black). TCR contacts are colored magenta. (B)Heatmap of amino acid preference by position for Ob.1A12 TCR. Thesequence for MBP is represented via outlined boxes. TCR contacts arelabeled red on the x axis. (C) Design and selection results of librarythat suppresses central ‘HF’ TCR recognition motif at P2-P3 of peptide.Resulting register shift is shown in blue on x axis. (D) Sequenceclustering shows distinct, related clusters of selected peptides.Sequence cluster placed in a representation of whole-library sequencespace (left: 1× magnification, center: 1000× magnification) forreference.

FIG. 7: Discovery of naturally occurring TCR ligands through deepsequencing and substitution matrix-based homology search. (A) Schematicfor ligand search strategy, in which a positional substitution matrix isgenerated from deep sequencing data and then used to find naturallyoccurring peptides that are represented within the matrix. (B)Functional characterization of a selection of naturally occurringpeptides with predicted activity. The peptides comprise a variety ofmicrobial, environmental, and self antigens. Activity is tested viaproliferation of T cells when exposed to peptide. Heatmaps arenormalized to 10 μM dose of MBP peptide for each T cell clone.

FIG. 8: Affinity measurement of ‘mini’ MCC-I-E^(k). SPR measurementusing soluble 226 TCR flowed over a surface containing either fulllength MCC-I-Ek (green) or “mini” MCC-I-Ek, as used for yeast selections

FIG. 9: Statistics and reads for 2B4 selections of I-Ek library. (A)Summary of total number of Illumina reads by round for 2B4 selections.Corrected sequences correspond to reads which were in frame with no stopcodons. Corrected unique peptides were the number of peptides presentwith greater than 4 unique sequence reads, after corrections for frame,stop codons, and 1 nt read errors (which were coalesced into the parentpeptides). (B) Relative enrichment for 25 most abundant peptide after 4rounds of selection with 2B4 TCR.

FIG. 10: Reads and distance clustering for selections of I-Ek library.(A) Total number of unique peptide sequences (top) and relativeenrichment for 25 most abundant peptides (bottom) through 4 rounds ofselection with 5cc7 and 226 TCRs. (B) Minimum distance clustering of allTCR sequences selected with maximum distance of 2 (left) and 3 (right)show different network topologies that coalesce into a single group.Compare to FIG. 3C.

FIG. 11: Characterization of library selected peptides via signaling andaffinity. (A) Dose response curves of IL-2 release assay for 2B4 and5cc7 T cell blasts. (B) and (C) Dose response curves of CD69upregulation assay for 2B4 and 5cc7 T cell blasts. Curves in blackrepresent peptides for which there were no sequencing reads for thegiven TCR. (D) Good correlation between EC50 of CD69 upregulation andIL-2 release for library selected peptide. (E) Sequence of peptidestested for binding via SPR. (F) SPR titrations for selected peptidesusing refolded 2B4 (left), 5cc7 (center), and 226 (right) TCRs.

FIG. 12: Features of TCR recognition of MCC and library-derived peptidesbound to I-Ek. (A) A shared contact exists between Arg29α of CDR1α andthe peptide in all four complexes. (B) Side chain flip of 2B4 Glu101βrepurposes former peptide-binding contact to intra-loop contact betweenMCC and 2A complexes. (C) Alignment of 5c1-I-Ek/5cc7 and5c2-I-E^(k)/5cc7 complexes shows essentially identical bindingfootprint. (D) Conversion of a hydrogen bond between Gln50β of 226 andP8 Thr in MCC (black) to a π-cation interaction between Gln50β of 5cc7and P8 Phe in 5c1 (red). (E) Significant deviation of TCR Cβ FG loopbetween MCC-I-Ek/226 and 5c1-I-Ek/5cc7 complexes correlates with reducedsignaling potency.

FIG. 13: Development of MBP-HLA-DR15 platform and selection with Ob.1A12and Ob.2F3 TCRs. (A) Staining of WT HLA-DR15 as well as multiplepotential variants with Ob.1A12 tetramer as well as anti HLA-DR15antibodies. “Mut3” was the final construct used for all studies. (B)Mutations required for functional display of MBP-HLA-DR15 yeast displayplatform. (C) Plots for amino acid prevalence at the three primary TCRcontact positions (P2 (magenta), P3 (green), and P5 (cyan)) show thepeptide library enriches from even representation of all amino acids inthe pre-selection library to a WT-like motif at each position. (D)Heatmap of amino acid preference by position for Ob.2F3 TCR (orange)shows little change from Ob.1A12 selections (see FIGS. 6B and 6C). (E)Minimum distance clustering of all TCR-selected with maximum distance of3. Compare to FIGS. 3C, 10B, and 6D.

FIG. 14: Creation of substitution matrix based upon TCR selection ofHLA-DR15 libraries for prediction of naturally occurring peptideligands. (A) Heatmaps for selection of library with P2 His, P3 Phe, andP5 Lys/Arg set to determine relative importance of residues more distalto TCR binding hotspot. Selections for Ob.1A12 (purple, right) andOb.2F3 (orange, right) look extremely similar. (B) Covariation analysisbetween P(−2) and P(−1) positions for Ob.1A12 (purple, left) and Ob.2F3(orange, right) show no significant covariation between residues,allowing for assumption of independently varying positions. Nocovariation for any other positions noted.

FIG. 15: Sequences of constructs, SEQ ID NO:1-6.

FIG. 16: Schematic of HLA-B5703 library and construct. The library wasconstructed with the P2 anchor of the peptide ligand fixed to A, T or Sand the P11 anchor fixed to F, Y or W.

FIG. 17: shows a heatmap of the search matrix after 3 rounds ofselection from the HLA-B5703 library in FIG. 16.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENTS

Before the subject invention is described further, it is to beunderstood that the invention is not limited to the particularembodiments of the invention described below, as variations of theparticular embodiments may be made and still fall within the scope ofthe appended claims. It is also to be understood that the terminologyemployed is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments, and isnot intended to be limiting. In this specification and the appendedclaims, the singular forms “a,” “an” and “the” include plural referenceunless the context clearly dictates otherwise.

Where a range of values is provided, it is understood that eachintervening value, to the tenth of the unit of the lower limit unlessthe context clearly dictates otherwise, between the upper and lowerlimit of that range, and any other stated or intervening value in thatstated range, is encompassed within the invention. The upper and lowerlimits of these smaller ranges may independently be included in thesmaller ranges, and are also encompassed within the invention, subjectto any specifically excluded limit in the stated range. Where the statedrange includes one or both of the limits, ranges excluding either orboth of those included limits are also included in the invention.

Unless defined otherwise, all technical and scientific terms used hereinhave the same meaning as commonly understood to one of ordinary skill inthe art to which this invention belongs. Although any methods, devicesand materials similar or equivalent to those described herein can beused in the practice or testing of the invention, illustrative methods,devices and materials are now described.

All publications mentioned herein are incorporated herein by referencefor the purpose of describing and disclosing the subject components ofthe invention that are described in the publications, which componentsmight be used in connection with the presently described invention.

The present invention has been described in terms of particularembodiments found or proposed by the present inventor to comprisepreferred modes for the practice of the invention. It will beappreciated by those of skill in the art that, in light of the presentdisclosure, numerous modifications and changes can be made in theparticular embodiments exemplified without departing from the intendedscope of the invention. For example, due to codon redundancy, changescan be made in the underlying DNA sequence without affecting the proteinsequence. Moreover, due to biological functional equivalencyconsiderations, changes can be made in protein structure withoutaffecting the biological action in kind or amount. All suchmodifications are intended to be included within the scope of theappended claims.

MHC Proteins. Major histocompatibility complex proteins (also calledhuman leukocyte antigens, HLA, or the H2 locus in the mouse) are proteinmolecules expressed on the surface of cells that confer a uniqueantigenic identity to these cells. MHC/HLA antigens are target moleculesthat are recognized by T-cells and natural killer (NK) cells as beingderived from the same source of hematopoietic reconstituting stem cellsas the immune effector cells (“self”) or as being derived from anothersource of hematopoietic reconstituting cells (“non-self”). Two mainclasses of HLA antigens are recognized: HLA class I and HLA class II.

The MHC proteins used in the libraries and methods of the invention maybe from any mammalian or avian species, e.g. primate sp., particularlyhumans; rodents, including mice, rats and hamsters; rabbits; equines,bovines, canines, felines; etc. Of particular interest are the human HLAproteins, and the murine H-2 proteins. Included in the HLA proteins arethe class II subunits HLA-DPα, HLA-DPβ, HLA-DQα, HLA-DQβ, HLA-DRα andHLA-DRβ, and the class I proteins HLA-A, HLA-B, HLA-C, andβ₂-microglobulin. Included in the murine H-2 subunits are the class IH-2K, H-2D, H-2L, and the class II I-Aα, I-Aβ, I-Eα and I-Eβ, andβ₂-microglobulin.

The MHC binding domains are typically a soluble form of the normallymembrane-bound protein. The soluble form is derived from the native formby deletion of the transmembrane domain. Conveniently, the protein istruncated, removing both the cytoplasmic and transmembrane domains. Insome embodiments, the binding domains of a major histocompatibilitycomplex protein are soluble domains of Class II alpha and beta chain. Insome such embodiments the binding domains have been subjected tomutagenesis and selected for amino acid changes that enhance thesolubility of the single chain polypeptide, without altering the peptidebinding contacts.

An “allele” is one of the different nucleic acid sequences of a gene ata particular locus on a chromosome. One or more genetic differences canconstitute an allele. An important aspect of the HLA gene system is itspolymorphism. Each gene, MHC class I (A, B and C) and MHC class II (DP,DQ and DR) exists in different alleles. Current nomenclature for HLAalleles are designated by numbers, as described by Marsh et al.:Nomenclature for factors of the HLA system, 2010. Tissue Antigens75:291-455, herein specifically incorporated by reference. For HLAprotein and nucleic acid sequences, see Robinson et al. (2011), TheIMGT/HLA database. Nucleic Acids Research 39 Suppl 1:D1171-6, hereinspecifically incorporated by reference.

The numbering of amino acid residues on the various MHC proteins andvariants disclosed herein is made to be consistent with the full lengthpolypeptide. Boundaries were set to either be the end of the MHC peptidebinding domain (as judged by examining crystal structures) for the‘mini’ MHCs, e.g. as exemplified herein with I-Ek, H2-Ld, and HLA-DR15,and the end of the Beta2/Alpha2/Alpha3 domains as judged by structureand/or sequence for the ‘full length’ MHCs, as exemplified herein withHLA-A2, -B57, and -DR4.

In some embodiments, the MHC portion of a construct is the MHC portiondelineated in any of SEQ ID NO:1-6. It will be understood by one ofskill in the art that the peptide and linker portions can be varied fromthe provided sequences.

MHC context. The function of MHC molecules is to bind peptide fragmentsderived from pathogens and display them on the cell surface forrecognition by the appropriate T cells. Thus T cell receptor recognitioncan be influenced by the MHC protein that is presenting the antigen. Theterm MHC context refers to the recognition by a TCR of a given peptide,when it is presented by a specific MHC protein.

Class II HLA/MHC. Class II binding domains generally comprise the α1 andα2 domains for the a chain, and the β1 and β2 domains for the β chain.Not more than about 10, usually not more than about 5, preferably noneof the amino acids of the transmembrane domain will be included. Thedeletion will be such that it does not interfere with the ability of theα2 or β2 domain to bind peptide ligands.

In some embodiments, the binding domains of a major histocompatibilitycomplex protein are soluble domains of Class II alpha and beta chain. Insome such embodiments the binding domains have been subjected tomutagenesis and selected for amino acid changes that enhance thesolubility of the single chain polypeptide, without altering the peptidebinding contacts.

In certain specific embodiments, the binding domains are an HLA-DRallele. The HLA-DRA protein can be selected, without limitation, fromthe binding domains of DRA*01:01:01:01; DRA*01:01:01:02;DRA*01:01:01:03; DRA*01:01:02; DRA*01:02:01; DRA*01:02:02; andDRA*01:02:03, which may be modified to comprise the amino acid changes{M36L, V132M}; or {F125, M23K}, depending on whether it is provided inthe context of a full-length or mini-allele. The HLA-DRA binding domainscan be combined with any one of the HLA-DRB binding domains.

In certain such embodiments, the HLA-DRA allele is paired with thebinding domains of an HLA-DRB4 allele. The HLA-DRB4 allele can beselected from the publicly available DRB4 alleles, including withoutlimitation: DRB1*04:01:01; DRB1*04:01:02; DRB1*04:01:03; DRB1*04:01:04;DRB1*04:01:05; DRB1*04:01:06; DRB1*04:01:07; DRB1*04:01:08;DRB1*04:01:09; DRB1*04:01:10; DRB1*04:01:11; DRB1*04:01:12;DRB1*04:01:13; DRB1*04:01:14; DRB1*04:02:01; DRB1*04:02:02;DRB1*04:02:03; DRB1*04:03:01; DRB1*04:03:02; DRB1*04:03:03;DRB1*04:03:04; DRB1*04:03:05; DRB1*04:03:06; DRB1*04:03:07;DRB1*04:03:08; DRB1*04:04:01; DRB1*04:04:02; DRB1*04:04:03;DRB1*04:04:04; DRB1*04:04:05; DRB1*04:04:06; DRB1*04:04:07;DRB1*04:04:08; DRB1*04:05:01; DRB1*04:05:02; DRB1*04:05:03;DRB1*04:05:04; DRB1*04:05:05; DRB1*04:05:06; DRB1*04:05:07;DRB1*04:05:08; DRB1*04:05:09; DRB1*04:05:10; DRB1*04:05:11;DRB1*04:05:13; DRB1*04:05:14; DRB1*04:05:15; DRB1*04:05:16;DRB1*04:06:01; DRB1*04:06:02; DRB1*04:06:03; DRB1*04:06:04;DRB1*04:06:05; DRB1*04:07:01; DRB1*04:07:02; DRB1*04:07:03;DRB1*04:07:04; DRB1*04:08:01; DRB1*04:08:02; DRB1*04:08:03; DRB1*04:09;DRB1*04:10:01; DRB1*04:10:02; DRB1*04:11:01; DRB1*04:11:02;DRB1*04:11:03; DRB1*04:12; DRB1*04:13; DRB1*04:14; DRB1*04:15;DRB1*04:16; DRB1*04:17:01; DRB1*04:17:02; DRB1*04:18; DRB1*04:19;DRB1*04:20; DRB1*04:21; DRB1*04:22; DRB1*04:23; DRB1*04:24; DRB1*04:25;DRB1*04:26; DRB1*04:27; DRB1*04:28; DRB1*04:29; DRB1*04:30; DRB1*04:31;DRB1*04:32; DRB1*04:33; DRB1*04:34; DRB1*04:35; DRB1*04:36; DRB1*04:37;DRB1*04:38; DRB1*04:39; DRB1*04:40; DRB1*04:41; DRB1*04:42; DRB1*04:43;DRB1*04:44; DRB1*04:45; DRB1*04:46; DRB1*04:47; DRB1*04:48; DRB1*04:49;DRB1*04:50; DRB1*04:51; DRB1*04:52; DRB1*04:53; DRB1*04:54; DRB1*04:55;DRB1*04:56; DRB1*04:57; DRB1*04:58; DRB1*04:59; DRB1*04:60; DRB1*04:61;DRB1*04:62; DRB1*04:63; DRB1*04:64; DRB1*04:65; DRB1*04:66; DRB1*04:67;DRB1*04:68; DRB1*04:69; DRB1*04:70; DRB1*04:71; DRB1*04:72:01;DRB1*04:72:02; DRB1*04:73; DRB1*04:74; DRB1*04:75; DRB1*04:76;DRB1*04:77; DRB1*04:78; DRB1*04:79; DRB1*04:80; DRB1*04:81N; DRB1*04:82;DRB1*04:83; DRB1*04:84; DRB1*04:85; DRB1*04:86; DRB1*04:87; DRB1*04:88;DRB1*04:89; DRB1*04:90; DRB1*04:91; DRB1*04:92; DRB1*04:93; DRB1*04:94N;DRB1*04:95:01; DRB1*04:95:02; DRB1*04:96; DRB1*04:97; DRB1*04:98:01;DRB1*04:98:02; DRB1*04:99; DRB1*04:100; DRB1*04:101; DRB1*04:102;DRB1*04:103; DRB1*04:104; DRB1*04:105:01; DRB1*04:105:02; DRB1*04:106;DRB1*04:107; DRB1*04:108; DRB1*04:109; DRB1*04:110; DRB1*04:111;DRB1*04:112; DRB1*04:113; DRB1*04:114; DRB1*04:115; DRB1*04:116;DRB1*04:117; DRB1*04:118; DRB1*04:119N; DRB1*04:120N; DRB1*04:121;DRB1*04:122; DRB1*04:123; DRB1*04:124; DRB1*04:125; DRB1*04:126;DRB1*04:127; DRB1*04:128; DRB1*04:129; DRB1*04:130; DRB1*04:131;DRB1*04:132; DRB1*04:133; DRB1*04:134; DRB1*04:135; DRB1*04:136;DRB1*04:137; DRB1*04:138; DRB1*04:139; DRB1*04:140; DRB1*04:141;DRB1*04:142N; DRB1*04:143; DRB1*04:144; DRB1*04:145; DRB1*04:146;DRB1*04:147; DRB1*04:148; DRB1*04:149; DRB1*04:150; DRB1*04:151;DRB1*04:152; DRB1*04:153; DRB1*04:154; DRB1*04:155; DRB1*04:156;DRB1*04:157N; DRB1*04:158N; DRB1*04:159; DRB1*04:160; DRB1*04:161;DRB1*04:162; DRB1*04:163; DRB1*04:164; DRB1*04:165; DRB1*04:166;DRB1*04:167; DRB1*04:168; DRB1*04:169; DRB1*04:170; DRB1*04:171; andDRB1*04:172; which may be modified to comprise the amino acid changes{H62N, D72E}.

In other such embodiments the HLA-DRA allele is paired with the bindingdomains of an HLA-DRB15 allele. The HLA-DRB15 allele can be selectedfrom the publicly available DRB15 alleles, including without limitation:DRB1*15:01:01:01; DRB1*15:01:01:02; DRB1*15:01:01:03; DRB1*15:01:01:04;DRB1*15:01:02; DRB1*15:01:03; DRB1*15:01:04; DRB1*15:01:05;DRB1*15:01:06; DRB1*15:01:07; DRB1*15:01:08; DRB1*15:01:09;DRB1*15:01:10; DRB1*15:01:11; DRB1*15:01:12; DRB1*15:01:13;DRB1*15:01:14; DRB1*15:01:15; DRB1*15:01:16; DRB1*15:01:17;DRB1*15:01:18; DRB1*15:01:19; DRB1*15:01:20; DRB1*15:01:21;DRB1*15:01:22; DRB1*15:02:01; DRB1*15:02:02; DRB1*15:02:03;DRB1*15:02:04; DRB1*15:02:05; DRB1*15:02:06; DRB1*15:02:07;DRB1*15:02:08; DRB1*15:02:09; DRB1*15:02:10; DRB1*15:03:01:01;DRB1*15:03:01:02; DRB1*15:03:02; DRB1*15:04; DRB1*15:05; DRB1*15:06:01;DRB1*15:06:02; DRB1*15:07:01; DRB1*15:07:02; DRB1*15:08; DRB1*15:09;DRB1*15:10; DRB1*15:11; DRB1*15:12; DRB1*15:13; DRB1*15:14; DRB1*15:15;DRB1*15:16; DRB1*15:17N; DRB1*15:18; DRB1*15:19; DRB1*15:20; DRB1*15:21;DRB1*15:22; DRB1*15:23; DRB1*15:24; DRB1*15:25; DRB1*15:26; DRB1*15:27;DRB1*15:28; DRB1*15:29; DRB1*15:30; DRB1*15:31; DRB1*15:32; DRB1*15:33;DRB1*15:34; DRB1*15:35; DRB1*15:36; DRB1*15:37:01; DRB1*15:37:02;DRB1*15:38; DRB1*15:39; DRB1*15:40; DRB1*15:41; DRB1*15:42; DRB1*15:43;DRB1*15:44; DRB1*15:45; DRB1*15:46; DRB1*15:47; DRB1*15:48; DRB1*15:49;DRB1*15:50N; DRB1*15:51; DRB1*15:52; DRB1*15:53; DRB1*15:54; DRB1*15:55;DRB1*15:56; DRB1*15:57; DRB1*15:58; DRB1*15:59; DRB1*15:60; DRB1*15:61;DRB1*15:62; DRB1*15:63; DRB1*15:64; DRB1*15:65; DRB1*15:66; DRB1*15:67;DRB1*15:68; DRB1*15:69; DRB1*15:70; DRB1*15:71; DRB1*15:72; DRB1*15:73;DRB1*15:74; DRB1*15:75; DRB1*15:76; DRB1*15:77; DRB1*15:78; DRB1*15:79;DRB1*15:80N; DRB1*15:81; DRB1*15:82; DRB1*15:83; DRB1*15:84; DRB1*15:85;DRB1*15:86; DRB1*15:87; DRB1*15:88; DRB1*15:89; DRB1*15:90; DRB1*15:91;DRB1*15:92; DRB1*15:93; DRB1*15:94; DRB1*15:95; DRB1*15:96; DRB1*15:97;DRB1*15:98; DRB1*15:99; DRB1*15:100; DRB1*15:101; DRB1*15:102;DRB1*15:103; and DRB1*15:104; which may be modified to comprise theamino acid changes {P11S}.

In other embodiments the Class II binding domains are an H2 protein,e.g. I-Aα, I-Aβ, I-Eα and I-Eβ. In some such embodiments, the bindingdomains are H2 IE^(k)α which may comprise the set of amino acid changes{18T, F12S, L14T, A56V}; and H2 IE^(k)β which may comprise the set ofamino acid changes {W6S, L8T, L34S}.

Class I HLA/MHC. For class I proteins, the binding domains may includethe α1, α2 and α3 domain of a Class I allele, including withoutlimitation HLA-A, HLA-B, HLA-C, H-2K, H-2D, H-2L, which are combinedwith β₂-microglobulin. Not more than about 10, usually not more thanabout 5, preferably none of the amino acids of the transmembrane domainwill be included. The deletion will be such that it does not interferewith the ability of the domains to bind peptide ligands.

In certain specific embodiments, the binding domains are HLA-A2 bindingdomains, e.g. comprising at least the alpha 1 and alpha 2 domains of anA2 protein. A large number of alleles have been identified in HLA-A2,including without limitation HLA-A*02:01:01:01 to HLA-A*02:478, whichsequences are available at, for example, Robinson et al. (2011), TheIMGT/HLA database. Nucleic Acids Research 39 Suppl 1:D1171-6. Among theHLA-A2 allelic variants, HLA-A*02:01 is the most prevalent. The bindingdomains may comprise the amino acid change {Y84A}.

In certain specific embodiments, the binding domains are HLA-B57 bindingdomains, e.g. comprising at least the alpha1 and alpha 2 domains of aB57 protein. The HLA-B57 allele can be selected from the publiclyavailable B57 alleles, including without limitation: B*57:01:01;B*57:01:02; B*57:01:03; B*57:01:04; B*57:01:05; B*57:01:06; B*57:01:07;B*57:01:08; B*57:01:09; B*57:01:10; B*57:01:11; B*57:01:12; B*57:01:13;B*57:01:14; B*57:01:15; B*57:01:16; B*57:01:17; B*57:02:01; B*57:02:02;B*57:03:01; B*57:03:02; B*57:04; B*57:05; B*57:06; B*57:07; B*57:08;B*57:09; B*57:10; B*57:11; B*57:12; B*57:13; B*57:14; B*57:15; B*57:16;B*57:17; B*57:18; B*57:19; B*57:20; B*57:21; B*57:22; B*57:23; B*57:24;B*57:25; B*57:26; B*57:27; B*57:28N; B*57:29; B*57:30; B*57:31; B*57:32;B*57:33; B*57:34; B*57:35; B*57:36; B*57:37; B*57:38; B*57:39; B*57:40;B*57:41; B*57:42; B*57:43; B*57:44; B*57:45; B*57:46; B*57:47; B*57:48;B*57:49; B*57:50; B*57:51; B*57:52; B*57:53; B*57:54; B*57:55; B*57:56;B*57:57; B*57:58; B*57:59; B*57:60; B*57:61; B*57:62; B*57:63; B*57:64;B*57:65; B*57:66; B*57:67; B*57:68; and B*57:69; which may be modifiedto comprise the amino acid change {Y84A}.

In other embodiments, the binding domains comprise H2-Ld alpha 1 andalpha 2 domains, which may comprise the amino acid change {M31R}.

T cell receptor, refers to the antigen/MHC binding heterodimeric proteinproduct of a vertebrate, e.g. mammalian, TCR gene complex, including thehuman TCR α, β, γ and δ chains. For example, the complete sequence ofthe human β TCR locus has been sequenced, as published by Rowen et al.(1996) Science 272(5269):1755-1762; the human a TCR locus has beensequenced and resequenced, for example see Mackelprang et al. (2006) HumGenet. 119(3):255-66; see a general analysis of the T-cell receptorvariable gene segment families in Arden Immunogenetics. 1995;42(6):455-500; each of which is herein specifically incorporated byreference for the sequence information provided and referenced in thepublication.

The multimerized T cell receptor for selection in the methods of theinvention is a soluble protein comprising the binding domains of a TCRof interest, e.g. TCRα/β, TCRγ/δ. The soluble protein may be a singlechain, or more usually a heterodimer. In some embodiments, the solubleTCR is modified by the addition of a biotin acceptor peptide sequence atthe C terminus of one polypeptide. After biotinylation at the acceptorpeptide, the TCR can be multimerized by binding to biotin bindingpartner, e.g. avidin, streptavidin, traptavidin, neutravidin, etc. Thebiotin binding partner can comprise a detectable label, e.g. afluorophore, mass label, etc., or can be bound to a particle, e.g. aparamagnetic particle. Selection of ligands bound to the TCR can beperformed by flow cytometry, magnetic selection, and the like as knownin the art.

Peptide ligands of the TCR are peptide antigens against which an immuneresponse involving T lymphocyte antigen specific response can begenerated. Such antigens include antigens associated with autoimmunedisease, infection, foodstuffs such as gluten, etc., allergy or tissuetransplant rejection. Antigens also include various microbial antigens,e.g. as found in infection, in vaccination, etc., including but notlimited to antigens derived from virus, bacteria, fungi, protozoans,parasites and tumor cells. Tumor antigens include tumor specificantigens, e.g. immunoglobulin idiotypes and T cell antigen receptors;oncogenes, such as p21/ras, p53, p210/bcr-abl fusion product; etc.;developmental antigens, e.g. MART-1/Melan A; MAGE-1, MAGE-3; GAGEfamily; telomerase; etc.; viral antigens, e.g. human papilloma virus,Epstein Barr virus, etc.; tissue specific self-antigens, e.g.tyrosinase; gp100; prostatic acid phosphatase, prostate specificantigen, prostate specific membrane antigen; thyroglobulin,α-fetoprotein; etc.; and self-antigens, e.g. her-2/neu; carcinoembryonicantigen, muc-1, and the like.

In the methods of the invention, a library of diverse peptide antigensis generated. The peptide ligand is from about 8 to about 20 amino acidsin length, usually from about 8 to about 18 amino acids, from about 8 toabout 16 amino acids, from about 8 to about 14 amino acids, from about 8to about 12 amino acids, from about 10 to about 14 amino acids, fromabout 10 to about 12 amino acids. It will be appreciated that a fullyrandom library would represent an extraordinary number of possiblecombinations. In preferred methods, the diversity is limited at theresidues that anchor the peptide to the MHC binding domains, which arereferred to herein as MHC anchor residues. The position of the anchorresidues in the peptide are determined by the specific MHC bindingdomains. Diversity may also be limited at other positions as informed bybinding studies, e.g. at TCR anchors.

Library. In some embodiments of the invention, a library is provided ofpolypeptides, or of nucleic acids encoding such polypeptides, whereinthe polypeptide structure has the formula:

polynucleotide composition encoding the P-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T polypeptide

wherein each of L₁, L₂ and L₃ are flexible linkers of from about 4 toabout 12 amino acids in length, e.g. comprising glycine, serine,alanine, etc.

α is a soluble form of a domains of a class I MHC protein, or class II aMHC protein;

β is a soluble form of (i) a β chain of a class II MHC protein or (ii)β₂ microglobulin for a class I MHC protein;

T is a domain that allows the polypeptide to be tethered to a cellsurface, including without limitation yeast Aga2; and

P is a peptide ligand, usually a library of different peptide ligands asdescribed above, where at least 10⁶, at least 10⁷, more usually at least10⁸ different peptide ligands are present in the library.

Conventional methods of assembling the coding sequences can be used. Inorder to generate the diversity of peptide ligands, randomization, errorprone PCR, mutagenic primers, and the like as known in the art are usedto create a set of polynucleotides. The library of polynucleotides istypically ligated to a vector suitable for the host cell of interest. Invarious embodiments the library is provided as a purified polynucleotidecomposition encoding the P-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T polypeptides; as a purifiedpolynucleotide composition encoding the P-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T polypeptidesoperably linked to an expression vector, where the vector can be,without limitation, suitable for expression in yeast cells; as apopulation of cells comprising the library of polynucleotides encodingthe P-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T polypeptides, where the population of cells can be,without limitation yeast cells, and where the yeast cells may be inducedto express the polypeptide library.

“Suitable conditions” shall have a meaning dependent on the context inwhich this term is used. That is, when used in connection with bindingof a T cell receptor to a polypeptide of the formula polynucleotidecomposition encoding the P-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T polypeptide, the term shallmean conditions that permit a TCR to bind to a cognate peptide ligand.When this term is used in connection with nucleic acid hybridization,the term shall mean conditions that permit a nucleic acid of at least 15nucleotides in length to hybridize to a nucleic acid having a sequencecomplementary thereto. When used in connection with contacting an agentto a cell, this term shall mean conditions that permit an agent capableof doing so to enter a cell and perform its intended function. In oneembodiment, the term “suitable conditions” as used herein meansphysiological conditions.

The term “specificity” refers to the proportion of negative test resultsthat are true negative test result. Negative test results include falsepositives and true negative test results.

The term “sensitivity” is meant to refer to the ability of an analyticalmethod to detect small amounts of analyte. Thus, as used here, a moresensitive method for the detection of amplified DNA, for example, wouldbe better able to detect small amounts of such DNA than would a lesssensitive method. “Sensitivity” refers to the proportion of expectedresults that have a positive test result.

The term “reproducibility” as used herein refers to the general abilityof an analytical procedure to give the same result when carried outrepeatedly on aliquots of the same sample.

Sequencing platforms that can be used in the present disclosure includebut are not limited to: pyrosequencing, sequencing-by-synthesis,single-molecule sequencing, second-generation sequencing, nanoporesequencing, sequencing by ligation, or sequencing by hybridization.Preferred sequencing platforms are those commercially available fromIllumina (RNA-Seq) and Helicos (Digital Gene Expression or “DGE”). “Nextgeneration” sequencing methods include, but are not limited to thosecommercialized by: 1) 454/Roche Lifesciences including but not limitedto the methods and apparatus described in Margulies et al., Nature(2005) 437:376-380 (2005); and U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,244,559; 7,335,762;7,211,390; 7,244,567; 7,264,929; 7,323,305; 2) Helicos BioSciencesCorporation (Cambridge, Mass.) as described in U.S. application Ser. No.11/167,046, and U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,501,245; 7,491,498; 7,276,720; and inU.S. Patent Application Publication Nos. US20090061439; US20080087826;US20060286566; US20060024711; US20060024678; US20080213770; andUS20080103058; 3) Applied Biosystems (e.g. SOLiD sequencing); 4) DoverSystems (e.g., Polonator G.007 sequencing); 5) IIlumina as describedU.S. Pat. Nos. 5,750,341; 6,306,597; and 5,969,119; and 6) PacificBiosciences as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,462,452; 7,476,504;7,405,281; 7,170,050; 7,462,468; 7,476,503; 7,315,019; 7,302,146;7,313,308; and US Application Publication Nos. US20090029385;US20090068655; US20090024331; and US20080206764. All references areherein incorporated by reference. Such methods and apparatuses areprovided here by way of example and are not intended to be limiting.

Methods and Compositions

Compositions and methods are provided for accurately identifying the setof peptides recognized by a T cell receptor in a given MHC context. Themethods involve the generation of a library of polypeptides in whichspecific MHC binding domains, which provide the MHC context, arecombined in a single polypeptide chain with a diverse library of peptideligands. The diversity of the library is as previously defined. Thesingle chain polypeptide may further comprise a domain that allows thepeptide to be tethered to, or otherwise inserted into a cell surface.

The peptide ligand is from about 8 to about 20 amino acids in length,usually from about 8 to about 18 amino acids, from about 8 to about 16amino acids, from about 8 to about 14 amino acids, from about 8 to about12 amino acids, from about 10 to about 14 amino acids, from about 10 toabout 12 amino acids. In preferred methods, the diversity is limited atthe residues that anchor the peptide to the MHC binding domains, whichare referred to herein as MHC anchor residues. The position of theanchor residues in the peptide are determined by the specific MHCbinding domains. Class I binding domains have anchor residues at the P2position, and at the last contact residue. Class II binding domains havean anchor residue at P1, and depending on the allele, at one of P4, P6or P9. For example, the anchor residues for IE^(k) are P1 {I,L,V} and P9{K}; the anchor residues for HLA-DR15 are P1 {I,L,V} and P4 {F, Y}.Anchor residues for DR alleles are shared at P1, with allele-specificanchor residues at P4, P6, P7, and/or P9.

The library can be provided in the form of a polynucleotide, e.g. acoding sequence operably linked to an expression vector; which isintroduced by transfection, electroporation, etc. into a suitable hostcell. Eukaryotic cells are preferred as a host, and may be anyconvenient host cell that can be transfected and selected for expressionof a protein on the cell surface. Yeast cells are a convenient host,although are not required for practice of the methods.

Once introduced in the host cells, expression of the library is inducedand the cells maintained for a period of time sufficient to provide cellsurface display of the polypeptides of the library.

Selection for a peptide that binds to the TCR of interest is performedby combining a multimerized TCR with the population of host cellsexpressing the library. The multimerized T cell receptor for selectionis a soluble protein comprising the binding domains of a TCR ofinterest, e.g. α/β, TCRγ/δ, and can be synthesized by any convenientmethod. The TCR may be a single chain, or a heterodimer. In someembodiments, the soluble TCR is modified by the addition of a biotinacceptor peptide sequence at the C terminus of one polypeptide. Afterbiotinylation at the acceptor peptide, the TCR can be multimerized bybinding to biotin binding partner, e.g. avidin, streptavidin,traptavidin, neutravidin, etc. The biotin binding partner can comprise adetectable label, e.g. a fluorophore, mass label, etc., or can be boundto a particle, e.g. a paramagnetic particle. Selection of ligands boundto the TCR can be performed by flow cytometry, magnetic selection, andthe like as known in the art.

Rounds of selection are performed until the selected population has asignal above background, usually at least three and more usually atleast four rounds of selection are performed. In some embodiments,initial rounds of selection, e.g. until there is a signal abovebackground, are performed with a TCR coupled to a magnetic reagent, suchas a superparamagnetic microparticle, which may be referred to as“magnetized”. Herein incorporated by reference, Molday (U.S. Pat. No.4,452,773) describes the preparation of magnetic iron-dextranmicroparticles and provides a summary describing the various means ofpreparing particles suitable for attachment to biological materials. Adescription of polymeric coatings for magnetic particles used in highgradient magnetic separation (HGMS) methods are found in U.S. Pat. No.5,385,707. Methods to prepare superparamagnetic particles are describedin U.S. Pat. No. 4,770,183. The microparticles will usually be less thanabout 100 nm in diameter, and usually will be greater than about 10 nmin diameter. The exact method for coupling is not critical to thepractice of the invention, and a number of alternatives are known in theart. Direct coupling attaches the TCR to the particles. Indirectcoupling can be accomplished by several methods. The TCR may be coupledto one member of a high affinity binding system, e.g. biotin, and theparticles attached to the other member, e.g. avidin. Alternatively onemay also use second stage antibodies that recognize species-specificepitopes of the TCR, e.g. anti-mouse Ig, anti-rat Ig, etc. Indirectcoupling methods allow the use of a single magnetically coupled entity,e.g. antibody, avidin, etc., with a variety of separation antibodies.

Alternatively, and in a preferred embodiment for final rounds ofselection, the TCR is multimerized to a reagent having a detectablelabel, e.g. for flow cytometry, mass cytometry, etc. For example, FACSsorting can be used to increase the concentration of the cells of havinga peptide ligand binding to the TCR. Techniques include fluorescenceactivated cell sorters, which can have varying degrees ofsophistication, such as multiple color channels, low angle and obtuselight scattering detecting channels, impedance channels, etc.

After a final round of selection, polynucleotides are isolated from theselected host cells, and the sequence of the selected peptide ligandsare determined, usually by high throughput sequencing. It is shownherein that the selection process results in determination of a set ofpeptides that are bound by the TCR in the specific HLA context. Thebiological activity of these ligands in the activation of T cells hasbeen validated. The set of selected ligands provides information aboutthe restrictions on amino acid positions required for binding to the Tcell receptor. Usually a plurality of peptide ligands are selected, e.g.up to 10, up to 100, up to 500, up to 1000 or more different peptidesequences.

The sequence data from this selected set of peptide ligands providesinformation about the restrictions on amino acids at each position ofthe peptide ligand. This can be shown graphically, see FIG. 3A-3B, orFIG. 6B-6C for examples. The restrictions can be particularly relevantat the residues contacting the TCR. Data regarding the restrictions onamino acids at positions of the peptide are input to design a searchalgorithm for analysis of public databases. The results of the searchprovide a set of peptides that meet the criteria for binding to the TCRin the MHC context. The search algorithm is usually embodied as aprogram of instructions executable by computer and performed by means ofsoftware components loaded into the computer.

Also provided herein are software products tangibly embodied in amachine-readable medium, the software product comprising instructionsoperable to cause one or more data processing apparatus to performoperations comprising: generating a n×20 matrix from the positionalfrequencies of selected peptide ligands obtained by the screeningmethods of the invention, where n is the number of amino acid positionsin the peptide ligand library. A cutoff of amino acid frequencies isset, e.g. less than 0.1, less than 0.05, less than 0.01, and frequenciesbelow the cutoff are set to zero. A database of sequences, e.g. a set ofhuman polypeptide sequences; a set of pathogen polypeptide sequences, aset of microbial polypeptide sequences, a set of allergen polypeptidesequences; etc. are searched with the algorithm using an n-positionsliding window alignment with scoring the product of positional aminoacid frequencies from the substitution matrix. An aligned segmentcontaining at least one amino acid where the frequency is below thecutoff is excluded as a match. The results of the search can be outputas a data file in a computer readable medium

The peptide sequence results and database search results may be providedin a variety of media to facilitate their use. “Media” refers to amanufacture that contains the expression repertoire information of thepresent invention. The databases of the present invention can berecorded on computer readable media, e.g. any medium that can be readand accessed directly by a computer. Such media include, but are notlimited to: magnetic storage media, such as floppy discs, hard discstorage medium, and magnetic tape; optical storage media such as CD-ROM;electrical storage media such as RAM and ROM; and hybrids of thesecategories such as magnetic/optical storage media. One of skill in theart can readily appreciate how any of the presently known computerreadable mediums can be used to create a manufacture comprising arecording of the present database information. “Recorded” refers to aprocess for storing information on computer readable medium, using anysuch methods as known in the art. Any convenient data storage structuremay be chosen, based on the means used to access the stored information.A variety of data processor programs and formats can be used forstorage, e.g. word processing text file, database format, etc.

As used herein, “a computer-based system” refers to the hardware means,software means, and data storage means used to analyze the informationof the present invention. The minimum hardware of the computer-basedsystems of the present invention comprises a central processing unit(CPU), input means, output means, and data storage means. A skilledartisan can readily appreciate that any one of the currently availablecomputer-based system are suitable for use in the present invention. Thedata storage means may comprise any manufacture comprising a recordingof the present information as described above, or a memory access meansthat can access such a manufacture.

A variety of structural formats for the input and output means can beused to input and output the information in the computer-based systemsof the present invention. Such presentation provides a skilled artisanwith a ranking of similarities and identifies the degree of similaritycontained in the test expression repertoire.

The search algorithm and sequence analysis may be implemented inhardware or software, or a combination of both. In one embodiment of theinvention, a machine-readable storage medium is provided, the mediumcomprising a data storage material encoded with machine readable datawhich, when using a machine programmed with instructions for using saiddata, is capable of displaying any of the datasets and data comparisonsof this invention. In some embodiments, the invention is implemented incomputer programs executing on programmable computers, comprising aprocessor, a data storage system (including volatile and non-volatilememory and/or storage elements), at least one input device, and at leastone output device. Program code is applied to input data to perform thefunctions described above and generate output information. The outputinformation is applied to one or more output devices, in known fashion.The computer may be, for example, a personal computer, microcomputer, orworkstation of conventional design.

Each program can be implemented in a high level procedural or objectoriented programming language to communicate with a computer system.However, the programs can be implemented in assembly or machinelanguage, if desired. In any case, the language may be a compiled orinterpreted language. Each such computer program can be stored on astorage media or device (e.g., ROM or magnetic diskette) readable by ageneral or special purpose programmable computer, for configuring andoperating the computer when the storage media or device is read by thecomputer to perform the procedures described herein. The system may alsobe considered to be implemented as a computer-readable storage medium,configured with a computer program, where the storage medium soconfigured causes a computer to operate in a specific and predefinedmanner to perform the functions described herein.

Further provided herein is a method of storing and/or transmitting, viacomputer, sequence, and other, data collected by the methods disclosedherein. Any computer or computer accessory including, but not limited tosoftware and storage devices, can be utilized to practice the presentinvention. Sequence or other data can be input into a computer by a usereither directly or indirectly. Additionally, any of the devices whichcan be used to sequence DNA or analyze DNA or analyze peptide bindingdata can be linked to a computer, such that the data is transferred to acomputer and/or computer-compatible storage device. Data can be storedon a computer or suitable storage device (e.g., CD). Data can also besent from a computer to another computer or data collection point viamethods well known in the art (e.g., the internet, ground mail, airmail). Thus, data collected by the methods described herein can becollected at any point or geographical location and sent to any othergeographical location.

Reagents and Kits

Also provided are reagents and kits thereof for practicing one or moreof the above-described methods. The subject reagents and kits thereofmay vary greatly. Reagents of interest include reagents specificallydesigned for use in the methods of the invention. Such a kit maycomprise a library of polynucleotides encoding a polypeptide of theformula P-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T, where a diverse set of peptide ligands isprovided. The polynucleotide library can be provided as a population oftransfected cells, or as an isolated population of nucleic acids.Reagents for labeling and multimerizing a TCR can be included. In someembodiments the kit will further comprise a software package foranalysis of a sequence database.

For example, reagents can include primer sets for high throughputsequencing. The kits can further include a software package for sequenceanalysis. The kit may include reagents employed in the various methods,such as labeled streptavidin, primers for generating target nucleicacids, dNTPs and/or rNTPs, which may be either premixed or separate, oneor more uniquely labeled dNTPs and/or rNTPs, such as biotinylated or Cy3or Cy5 tagged dNTPs, gold or silver particles with different scatteringspectra, or other post synthesis labeling reagent, such as chemicallyactive derivatives of fluorescent dyes, enzymes, such as reversetranscriptases, DNA polymerases, RNA polymerases, and the like, variousbuffer mediums, e.g. hybridization and washing buffers, prefabricatedprobe arrays, labeled probe purification reagents and components, likespin columns, etc., signal generation and detection reagents, e.g.streptavidin-alkaline phosphatase conjugate, chemifluorescent orchemiluminescent substrate, and the like.

In addition to the above components, the subject kits will furtherinclude instructions for practicing the subject methods. Theseinstructions may be present in the subject kits in a variety of forms,one or more of which may be present in the kit. One form in which theseinstructions may be present is as printed information on a suitablemedium or substrate, e.g., a piece or pieces of paper on which theinformation is printed, in the packaging of the kit, in a packageinsert, etc. Yet another means would be a computer readable medium,e.g., diskette, CD, etc., on which the information has been recorded.Yet another means that may be present is a website address which may beused via the internet to access the information at a removed, site. Anyconvenient means may be present in the kits.

The above-described analytical methods may be embodied as a program ofinstructions executable by computer to perform the different aspects ofthe invention. Any of the techniques described above may be performed bymeans of software components loaded into a computer or other informationappliance or digital device. When so enabled, the computer, appliance ordevice may then perform the above-described techniques to assist theanalysis of sets of values associated with a plurality of peptides inthe manner described above, or for comparing such associated values. Thesoftware component may be loaded from a fixed media or accessed througha communication medium such as the internet or other type of computernetwork. The above features are embodied in one or more computerprograms may be performed by one or more computers running suchprograms.

Software products (or components) may be tangibly embodied in amachine-readable medium, and comprise instructions operable to cause oneor more data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising: a)clustering sequence data from a plurality of immunological receptors orfragments thereof; and b) providing a statistical analysis output onsaid sequence data. Also provided herein are software products (orcomponents) tangibly embodied in a machine-readable medium, and thatcomprise instructions operable to cause one or more data processingapparatus to perform operations comprising: storing and analyzingsequence data.

EXAMPLES

The following examples are offered by way of illustration and not by wayof limitation.

Example 1 Mechanism for Specificity of T Cell Recognition of Peptide-MHC

In order to survey a universe of MHC-presented peptide antigens whosenumbers greatly exceed the diversity of the T cell repertoire, T cellreceptors (TCRs) are thought to be crossreactive. However,experimentally measuring the extent of TCR cross-reactivity has not beenachieved. We developed a system to identify MHC-presented peptideligands by combining TCR selection of highly diverse yeast-displayedpeptide-MHC libraries with deep sequencing. While we identified hundredsof peptides reactive with each of five different mouse and human TCRs,the selected peptides possessed TCR recognition motifs that bore a closeresemblance to their known antigens. This structural conservation of theTCR interaction surface allowed us to exploit deep sequencinginformation to computationally identify activating microbial andself-ligands for human autoimmune TCRs. The mechanistic basis of TCRcross-reactivity described here enables effective surveillance ofdiverse self and foreign antigens, but without requiring degeneraterecognition of non-homologous peptides.

T cells are central to many aspects of adaptive immunity. Each mature Tcell expresses a unique αβ T cell receptor (TCR) that has been selectedfor its ability to bind to peptides presented by majorhistocompatibility complex (MHC) molecules. During the course of T celldevelopment, survival, and effector functions, a given TCR surveys abroad landscape of self and foreign peptides and only responds toligands whose engagement exceeds certain affinity, kinetic andoligomerization thresholds. Unlike antibodies, TCRs generally have lowaffinity for ligands (KD˜1-100 μM), which has been speculated tofacilitate rapid scanning of peptide-MHC (pMHC).

Structural studies of TCR-pMHC complexes have revealed a bindingorientation where, generally, the TCR CDR1 and CDR2 loops make themajority of contacts with the tops of the MHC helices while the CDR3loops, which are conformationally malleable, primarily engage thepeptide presented in the MHC groove. The low affinity and fast kineticsof TCR-pMHC binding, combined with conformational plasticity in the CDR3loops, would seem to facilitate cross-reactivity with structurallydistinct peptides presented by MHC. Indeed, given that the calculateddiversity of potential peptide antigens is much larger than TCR sequencediversity, and certainly exceeds the number of T cells in an individual,TCR crossreactivity appears to be a biological imperative.

Crossreactive TCRs have been implicated in the pathogenesis of a numberof autoimmune diseases, and have been proposed to explain why sequentialinfections in mice result in protective differences in immune pathologyand the hierarchy of immunodominance. In humans, there is a growingrecognition that vaccination can have a more general impact on morbidityand mortality beyond the expected benefit in preventing the targeteddisease. Nevertheless, the true extent of TCR cross-reactivity, and itsrole in T cell immunity, remains a speculative issue, largely due to theabsence of quantitative experimental approaches that could definitivelyaddress this question. While many examples exist of TCRs recognizingsubstituted or homologous peptides related to the antigen, such asaltered peptide ligands, most of these peptides retain similarities tothe wild-type peptides and are recognized in a highly similar fashion.Only a handful of defined examples exist of a single TCR recognizingnon-homologous sequences. Examples from nature are rare, and there hasnot been a robust methodology to identify non-homologous peptidescross-reactive with a given TCR using screening approaches.

One approach that has been used to estimate cross-reactivity utilizespooled, chemically synthesized peptide libraries. Based on a calculationtaking into account the assumed concentrations of each agonist peptidein the pools, and the aggregate EC50 of the pool in stimulating a T cellclone, it has been extrapolated that ˜10⁶ different peptides in mixturescontaining ˜10¹² different peptides were agonists. However, while thismethodology has successfully isolated a handful of significantly diversesequences, most studies using the technique find only close homologuesto known peptides. Furthermore, these libraries were assayed basedsolely on bulk stimulatory ability, with only femtomolar concentrationsof any given peptide and no knowledge of peptide loading in the MHC orbinding to the TCR. Therefore, the contributions of weakly reactivepeptides or rare sequences are extremely difficult to isolate.

A more accurate estimate of cross-reactivity requires the isolation ofindividual sequences from a library of MHC-presented peptides based uponbinding to a TCR. Recently, we and others have created libraries ofpeptides linked to MHC via yeast and baculovirus display as a method todiscover TCR ligands through affinity-based selections that rely on aphysical interaction between the peptide-MHC and the TCR (Adams et al.(2011). Immunity 35, 681-693; Birnbaum et al. (2012). Immunol Rev 250,82-101). However, these methods have so far not been used to address thebroader question of TCR cross-reactivity, mainly due to the requirementof manually validating and sequencing individual library ‘hits’, whichhas restricted the approach to discovering small numbers of peptides.

Here, we use deep sequencing of yeast peptide-MHC libraries selectedagainst five murine and human TCRs. Starting with ˜10⁸ transformantlibraries, we discovered hundreds of unique peptide sequences recognizedby each TCR. Strikingly, all peptide sequences bear TCR epitopes withclose similarity to their previously known agonist antigens and engagethe TCRs in structurally similar ways. With an understanding of thisproperty, we created a computational algorithm to predict naturallyoccurring TCR ligands using data from our deep sequencing results. Thealgorithm identified thousands of previously unknown microbial andenvironmental peptides as well as several peptides of human originpredicted to cross-react with self-reactive TCRs derived from a patientwith multiple sclerosis. We tested a diverse set of the putativeTCR-reactive peptides and found 94% are able to elicit a T cellresponse. In general, TCR cross-reactivity does not appear to becharacterized by broad degeneracy, but rather is constrained to a smallnumber of TCR contact residue ‘hotspots’ on a peptide, while toleratinggreater diversity at other positions. This understanding of theproperties of TCR cross-reactivity has broad implications for ligandidentification, vaccine design, and immunotherapy.

We developed a system for the rapid and sensitive detection ofTCR-binding peptides presented by the murine class II MHC I-E^(k). Thisrepresents an advance over previous reports of class II pMHC moleculesdisplayed on the surface of yeast that did not show the ability to bindTCR (Birnbaum et al., supra; Boder et al. (2005). Biotechnol Bioeng 92,485-491; Esteban and Zhao (2004). J Mol Biol 340, 81-95.; Jiang andBoder, 2010 Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 107, 13258-13263; Starwalt et al.,2003 Protein engineering 16, 147-156; Wen et al., 2008 J Immunol Methods336, 37-44; Wen et al., 2011 Protein Eng Des Sel 24, 701-709). We wereaided by a large compendium of biophysical data for the interaction ofI-E^(k) with several TCRs.

We designed our construct as a ‘mini’ single-chain MHC Aga2 fusion, withthe truncated peptide binding α1β1 domains fused via a Gly-Ser linker.We linked the wild-type peptide MCC to the N-terminus via a Gly-Serlinker (FIG. 1A). The initial construct was correctly routed to theyeast surface but did not have the ability to bind to TCR, indicatingthe pMHC was not correctly folded (FIG. 1B). In order to rescue correctfolding of the pMHC, we subjected the mini I-E^(k) to error-pronemutagenesis combined with introduction of solubility-enhancingmutations.

We selected this mutagenized mini scaffold for binding to the 2B4 TCR,which recognizes MCC-I-E^(k) with moderate affinity and slow kinetics.Our selections yielded a functional construct with three mutations onthe α1 domain—two solubilizing mutations in what was previously theα1-α2 interface and one mutation between the MHC helix and the betasheets (FIG. 1B). Staining was further improved via introduction ofthree solubility-enhancing mutations of residues underneath the platformthat are normally shielded from solvent by the MHC α2 and β2 domains(FIG. 1B). None of the MHC residues mutated contacted either the peptideor the TCR. The evolved construct retained specific binding to severalMCC-I-E^(k) recognizing TCRs and showed comparable affinity to thewild-type pMHC (FIG. 1B, 8).

We then created a peptide library tethered to the MHC construct fordisplay on yeast. Based upon the recently solved 2B4-MCC-I-E^(k)structure, we mutagenized the peptide from P(−2) to P10 (FIG. 10).Limited diversity was introduced at the two most distal residues and theprimary MHC-binding anchor residues at P1 and P9 to maximize the numberof peptides capable of being correctly displayed by the MHC (FIG. 10).This library had a theoretical sequence diversity of 5.3×10¹³, althoughonly 1.8×10⁸ sequences were represented in our library due to the limitsof transformation efficiency.

Our first attempts at screening involved ‘manual curation’ of selectionsconducted with multivalent TCR. The library showed enrichment afterthree rounds of selection using highly avid TCR-coated streptavidinbeads followed by a higher stringency ‘polishing’ round of selectionusing TCR tetramers. The three peptides recovered via sequencing of 12individual, hand picked clones after selection were related to the WTMCC peptide—the P2, P5, and P8 TCR contacts were all conserved, while P3showed highly conservative Tyr to Phe mutation (FIG. 1D). These resultssuggested that a WT-like TCR recognition motif was highly favored. Wesurmised that these enriched WT sequences present in the later roundsdominated the selections, preventing alternative, potentiallynon-homologous sequences enriched in early rounds from being recovered.For this reason, we turned to deep sequencing at each step of theselection process to recover all enriched clones.

Deep sequencing of selections for TCR-binding peptides. Analysis of thepooled yeast library DNA after each successive round of selection viadeep sequencing showed enrichment from an essentially randomdistribution of amino acids to a highly WT-like TCR recognition motif(FIGS. 2A, 9A). After the third round, there were nonhomologous aminoacids at P5 and P8 selected above background (Met and Ser for P5, Ileand Leu for P8) that were outcompeted by the WT-like motif by the finalround of selection. The P3 position converged to Phe, homologous but notidentical to the Tyr in the WT peptide (FIG. 2A) Overall, the number ofunique peptides observed via deep sequencing progressed from 132,000unique in-frame peptides observed in the sequenced portion ofpre-selection library to only 207 unique peptides after the 3rd round ofselection (FIGS. 2B, 2C, 9A, 9B). By the final round of selection, mostof the library was dominated by a handful of sequences, matching theresult obtained by manual curation (FIGS. 1D, 2B, 2C).

We therefore chose to conduct all analysis after round 3, since the dataconsisted of enriched clones that had not yet converged on a smallnumber of sequences. We were also able to track the enrichment profileof individual peptides, finding most peptides enriched roughly 50-foldbetween rounds (FIGS. 2B, 9B). We repeated the selections with two otherTCRs reactive to MCC-I-E^(k): 226 and 5cc7. We analyzed enrichment foreach TCR after the third round of selection, where there is enrichmentfor a binding motif but before complete convergence to a small number ofsequences (FIGS. 2A, 3A, 9B, 10A). While all three TCRs retain a WT-likeTCR recognition motif such as P5 Lys (indicated by the outlined boxes inthe heatmaps), each TCR also shows some variation in positionalpreferences (FIG. 3A). For example, where 2B4 can recognize P5 Met, 5cc7can accommodate P5 Leu, Val, and Arg. The P3 TCR contact position showedthe least variance across all three TCRs, with either Phe or Tyr beingrequired for 2B4 and 5cc7, and Phe, Tyr, or Trp being required for 226(FIG. 3A).

While each TCR recognized a largely WT-like motif, each recognized adifferent number of unique peptide sequences (FIG. 10A). 2B4 showed thehighest stringency for its ligands, with only 207 sequences recoveredfrom the selection that had enriched above the maximum backgroundfrequency of 1×10⁻⁴ observed in any pre-selected clone. 226, aspreviously reported, showed a greater degree of cross-reactivity, ableto recognize 897 unique peptide sequences. The larger number of peptidesrecognized was largely a function of a higher tolerance forsubstitutions on TCR-neutral and MHC-contacting residues, such as atpositions P(−1) and P4 (FIG. 3A).

The large collection of peptides recovered via deep sequencing enabledus to apply a co-variation analysis to discover intra-peptidestructure-activity relationships that were not previously accessiblewith traditional single residue substitution analysis (FIG. 3B). Byusing co-variation analysis of the central P5 residue and the C-terminalP8 residue, a pattern emerged: the native, MCC-like ‘up-facing’TCR-contact motifs for each TCR (P5 Lys, P8 Ser/Thr) were stronglycorrelated, while the altered residues (P5 Ser/P8Leu for 2B4, P5 Leu orArg/P8 Phe for 5cc7) were independently segregated (FIG. 3B). Therefore,the reason some of these TCR contacts were not previously described isthat they do not occur independently. Instead, coupled changes across anetwork of peptide residues may be required to retain TCR binding. Theseresults highlight a degree of cooperativity in the composition ofresidues comprising a ‘TCR epitope’ that is clearly revealed with deepsequencing. Furthermore, such intra-peptide residue coupling revealsthat cross-reactivity can occur through mutually compensatorysubstitutions to the parent peptide.

While the selected ligands for all three TCRs possessed shared features,each TCR also selected for a subset of sequences that were not selectedby the other two. We wished to determine if these sequences were part ofthe larger parent MCC-like peptide family or constituted distinctfamilies of peptide sequences. To determine this, we applied distanceclustering to all of the peptides selected for all three TCRs (FIG. 3C).We found that while sequences recognized by individual TCRs clusteredmost closely to each other, essentially all of the selected sequencesformed one large cluster of peptides no more than three amino acidsdifferent than at least one other peptide in the cluster (FIG. 3C, 10B).This suggests that while each TCR has unique recognition criteria, thethree TCRs recognized many of the same peptides. Furthermore, peptidesthat were recognized by all three TCRs are related to a commonspecificity domain, and importantly, to the parent MCC ligand.

Even though we conducted unbiased selections of random libraries, theonly ligands that were recovered were remarkably similar to the WTligand at the TCR interface. Indeed, we attempted to prevent theoccurrence of wild-type like peptides from being selected by creating apeptide library that suppressed the Lysine codon at P5, but thatretained diversity at all other positions. Nevertheless, these ‘K-less’libraries failed to select for any TCR tetramer-staining clones whenselected with 2B4 TCR. This experiment showed that the recovery of thewild-type TCR binding motifs in the original library was not simply dueto wild-type like sequences suppressing the appearance of non-homologouscrossreactive peptides.

Functional characterization of I-Ek library hits. We tested thesignaling potencies and affinities of a subset of peptides selected forTCR binding. We synthesized 44 of the library peptides selected forbinding to various subsets of the TCRs and examined their ability tostimulate T cell blasts from 2B4 and 5cc7 transgenic mice as assayed byCD69 upregulation and IL-2 production. The majority of the peptidespredicted to bind 2B4 (19/19) and 5cc7 (17/21) expressing T cellsinduced CD69 upregulation (FIGS. 4A, 4B, 11A-D). The peptides had a widerange of potencies, with EC50s varying by several logs, including˜50-fold more potent than the wild-type peptide MCC (colored red). Whenwe compared the presence of the MCC-like TCR recognition epitope withTCR signaling, we found that in general, sequences that shared theMCC-like epitope at all three major TCR contacts (colored blue) weremore potent in inducing signaling than those peptides that were moredistantly related (colored black) (FIGS. 4A, 4B), speaking to thefunctional dominance of the wild-type motifs. We also tested thepeptides selected for binding to one TCR for their ability to crossreactwith the other MCC-reactive T cells. Surprisingly, a large proportion ofthese peptides potently activated TCR signaling (FIGS. 4A, 4B, 11A-D).

There was a significant difference in EC50s between peptides that wereselected to bind to 2B4 versus the 5cc7/226-selected peptides tested for2B4 T cell activation. For 5cc7 the EC50s for the two groups(5cc7-selected versus cross-reactive with 2B4/226-selected) areessentially identical. In general, the sequences that showed the mostrobust activation were again the ones that most closely shared the MCCTCR binding epitope. We additionally chose nine peptides from ourinitial set of 46 and exchanged them into soluble I-Ek MHC for TCRaffinity measurements via surface plasmon resonance (SPR). For 2B4 and5cc7, TCR bound the pMHC of interest with affinities ranging from KD of˜1 μM (over 10-fold better than MCC) to those with binding only barelydetectable at 100 μM TCR (FIG. 11E-F). When we compared the activity andaffinity of our selected peptides, there is a loose but positivecorrelation between strength of TCR-pMHC binding and potency ofactivation (FIG. 4C). Several peptides with significantly differentaffinities show similar potencies (FIG. 4C).

The structural basis of TCR recognition of cross-reactive peptides. Todetermine the molecular basis of the TCRs' ability to recognize the mostdiverse of the alternate peptides selected, we determined the crystalstructures of 2B4 in complex with the library-derived 2A peptide(containing P5 Ser and P8 Ile) bound to I-E^(k), as well as 5cc7 incomplex with two library-derived peptides bound to I-E^(k), 5c1 and 5c2(containing P5 Leu/Arg and P8 Phe, respectively) (Table 1). When thesecomplexes were aligned with previously solved complex structures of TCRs(2B4 and 226) binding to MCC-I-E^(k), very little deviation in overallTCR-pMHC complex geometry from the parent complexes was observed (FIGS.5A and 5B). Since the MCC-I-E^(k)-5cc7 complex is not solved, 5c1 and5c2 were compared to MCC-I-Ek-226, which shares the TCRβ chain with 5cc7and therefore likely retains a close footprint.

The contacts between TCR germline-derived CDR1/2 loops and MHC helices,which make up roughly 50% of the binding interface between TCR and pMHC,were essentially unchanged in the new peptide complexes versus MCCdespite the difference in TCR contact residues in the peptides (FIG.5C). When we examined the chemistry of MCC versus 2A, and MCC versus 5c1peptide recognition by the respective TCRs, we saw the interactionbetween the TCRα CDR loops and the N-terminal half of the peptides areessentially invariant (FIGS. 5A and 5B, lower panels). Each peptidebackbone makes a hydrogen bond at the P3 carbonyl with Arg29α in the TCRCDR1α loop. The contacts of 2B4 CDR3α with P2 and P3 in MCC and 2A areessentially identical (FIG. 5A, lower panels).

While an exact analogy cannot be made between 5cc7 recognizing 5c1 and226 recognizing MCC due to sequence differences in their CDR3 loops,5cc7 and 226 CDR3α loop conformations and peptide contacts are extremelysimilar (FIG. 5B, lower panels). The fact that all three MCC-reactiveTCRs enrich for the same peptide residues at P2 and P3 (FIG. 3A)indicates that recognition peptides at their N-terminal contacts arehighly conserved within this group (FIG. 5B, lower panels). In contrast,2B4 and 5cc7 β chain CDR loop interactions with the C termini of thepeptides show marked changes to accommodate the non-MCC sequences. For2B4, the CDR3β loop conformation completely rearranges to engage thealternate P5 and P8 residues on the 2A peptide (FIG. 5A, lower panels).Gln100β, a residue that makes no contact with the peptide in the 2B4-MCCcomplex structure, flips its side chain by 180 degrees to form hydrogenbonds with the peptide backbone carbonyl oxygens at P5 and P6 (FIG. 5A,lower panels). Similarly, the side chains of Trp98β and Ser99β formhydrogen bonds with the P5 Ser hydroxyl moiety (FIG. 5A). Asp101β, oneof the main contacts with P5 Lys in MCC, also undergoes a rearrangement.Instead of contacting the peptide, the side chain forms a hydrogen bondwith Ser95β on the other end of the CDR3β loop, significantly alteringthe overall topology of the loop.

In the 5c1-I-E^(k)/5cc7 complex, there are far fewer hydrogen bondsformed between the peptide and TCR due to the replacement of P5 Lys withLeu in the 5c1 peptide (FIG. 5B, lower panels). One side chain, Asn98β,changes its hydrogen bonding network from engaging only the carbonyl ofP6 on the MCC peptide backbone to simultaneously interacting with thecarbonyl oxygen of P6 and the amide nitrogen of P8 of the 5c1 peptide(FIG. 5B). The second peptide, 5c2, is recognized essentiallyidentically by 5cc7 as 5c1 despite the substitution of P5 to Arg (FigureS5C). The substitution of a bulkier side chain at P8 (Phe instead ofThr), results in a rocking of 5cc7 such that the TCR Cβ FG loop istranslated by 15 Å relative to the MCC-226 structure (Figure S5D-E). Theshift of the TORR chain is correlated with accommodation of a bulkyhydrophobic residue Phe at P8 on the peptide. It is interesting to notethat 5c1 and MCC differ by several logs in signaling potency (EC50 of1.5 μM vs 8.4 nM) despite a relatively small difference in affinity (KDof 115 μM vs 41 μM). Indeed, all tested peptides with P8 Phe signal lessefficiently than MCC-like peptides, even when affinities are closelymatched (such as for 5c3, which binds to 5cc7 with a KD of 62 μM) (FIG.11E-F). These structures raise the question if a minor tilt of the TCRrelative to the MHC can have consequences for signaling.

Strikingly, upon closer inspection, we find that homologies between whatappear to be unrelated peptide sequences emerge from sequence clusteringand structural analysis. For example, close structural relationshipsbetween the interaction modes of the 2B4-selected peptides MCC and 2Aare apparent even though the peptides show little homology at 4/5 TCRcontact positions (FIG. 5A). We also set out to determine if we couldidentify intermediate sequences that would ‘evolutionarily’ link thesetwo peptide sequences during the selection, given that both reside inthe same sequence cluster (FIG. 3C).

Using our dataset of peptide sequences selected for 2B4 binding, we wereable to populate a family of peptides that incrementally link MCC and2A, with each peptide differing by only one TCR contact from the peptidebefore and after it (FIG. 5D). Thus, connectivity can be establishedbetween MCC and 2A through stepwise single amino acid drifts from theirparent sequences.

Collectively, despite differences in peptide sequences, all MCC andlibrary-peptide derived complexes share many common features withregards to docking geometry and interaction chemistry. Up-facing peptideresidue sequence changes (e.g. P5, P8) are accommodated ‘locally’ in astructurally parsimonious fashion that preserves most of the parent MCCpeptide complex features, as opposed to accommodation through largescale repositioning of the CDR loops on the pMHC surface.

Development and selection of a human MHC platform for yeast display. Toexploit our technology to find ligands for TCRs relevant to humandisease, we also engineered the human MHC HLA-DR15, an allele withgenetic linkage to multiple sclerosis. For yeast surface display,HLA-DR15 was constructed comparably to the murine I-E^(k) β1α1 ‘mini’MHC with a peptide fused to the N terminus (FIG. 6A). We chose toexamine two closely-related TCRs, Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3, that were clonedfrom a patient with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis and recognizeHLADR15 bound to an immunodominant epitope of myelin basic protein (MBP,residues 85-99) peptide. These two TCRs utilize the same Vα-Jα and Vβ-Jβgene segments and differ at one position in the CDR3α loop and twopositions in CDR3β. Ob.1A12 TCR is sufficient to cause disease in ahumanized TCR transgenic mouse model.

A structure of Ob.1A12 complexed with HLA-DR15-MBP revealed an atypicaldocking mode, with the TCR shifted towards the N-terminus of thepeptide. Ob.1A12 recognition of the MBP peptide is focused on aP2-His/P3-Phe TCR contact motif, and to a lesser extent on P5 Lys (FIG.6B). The initial wild-type MBP-HLA-DR15 yeast display construct was notstained by Ob.1A12 TCR tetramers (FIG. 6A). Therefore, as with the I-Ekplatform, we subjected this construct to error prone mutagenesis andselected for binding with Ob.1A12. In this fashion, mutations were foundthat enabled functional display, as measured by tetramer staining.

Our final construct combined the most heavily selected mutation(Pro11Ser on HLA-DR15β) with two solubility-enhancing mutations on thebottom of the platform that were analogous to mutations required forI-Ek function (FIG. 6B). This construct stained robustly with Ob.1A12and Ob.2F3 TCRs, as well as two MHC-specific antibodies (FIG. 6A). Wedesigned a peptide library within the HLA-DR15 mini MHC scaffold to findnovel Ob.1A12-binding peptides (FIG. 6A). Since Ob.1A12 binds itscognate pMHC shifted towards the N terminus of the peptide, we extendedthe library, randomizing from P(−4) to P10 compared to P(−2) to P10 forI-Ek (Hahn et al., 2005). The P1 and P4 positions, the strongest peptideanchors for HLA-DR15, were only afforded limited diversity.

The library was selected for binding to both Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3 TCRtetramers and then each round was deep sequenced. We observed a strongconvergence to a wild-type MBP-like TCR recognition motif for theprimary Ob.1A12 TCR contacts (P2 His, P3 Phe, and P5 Lys) (FIG. 6B).Selections conducted with Ob.2F3 produced the same central ‘HF’ MBP-likemotif while showing slightly different enrichment patterns at proximalresidues (Figure S6D). Given the dominance of ‘HF’ in the selectionresults, we sought to determine if alternative cross-reactive TCRepitopes for Ob.1A12 would emerge if the up-facing ‘HF’ motif wassuppressed.

We made a library that allowed every amino acid except for His at P2,Phe at P3, and Lys at P5 (FIG. 6C). The selected clones still convergedto a central HF motif by register shifting towards the C-terminus of thepeptide by one amino acid, allowing the previous P4 Phe anchor to berepurposed as the P3 TCR contact, and the P3 position of the library tobecome the new P2 His TCR contact (FIG. 6C). Furthermore, when wesubsequently prevented both His and Phe at P2 and P3 in a new library tosuppress potential register shifting, we did not isolate anyOb.1A12-binding peptides. These results show that the ‘HF’ motif isrequired for TCR recognition and its enrichment is a function of TCRpreference, not any inherent biases caused by the library or MHC anchorpositions of the peptide.

Clustering analysis of the selected peptides for both Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3showed that the selected peptides clustered with each other over theunselected peptides from the naïve library (FIG. 6D). The overallclustering topology of the selected peptides was different than the I-Ekselections: instead of a single network encompassing all peptides, therewere two distinct clusters consisting of peptides no more than 4 aminoacids different from each other (FIG. 6D). When the stringency ofclustering is increased to allow no more than 3 amino acid differences,matching the analysis done for I-Ek, there were several more sparseclusters. Since Ob1.A12 and Ob.2F3 are so focused on the HF motif, thereare fewer total hotspot residues distributed on the peptide compared tothe MCC-reactive TCRs we studied.

High-confidence prediction of naturally occurring TCR-reactive peptides.The surprisingly limited tolerance of the TCRs for alternative ligandspoints to the feasibility of unambiguously identifying natural TCRligands through selection with a random peptide library. However,library selections and deep sequencing alone are not sufficient toidentify naturally occurring ligands for two reasons. First, the size ofyeast libraries (˜2×10⁸ unique sequences) relative to all possiblepMHC-displayed peptides makes it unlikely that any given naturallyoccurring peptide sequence will exist in the library. Second, the aminoacid substitutions that are permitted at each position along the peptiderepresent a complex, and as our covariation analysis indicated,cooperative interplay between the peptide, MHC, and TCR that may not bewell described by common substitution matrices such as BLOSUM. Forexample, even though manual inspection of Ob.1A12-binding sequencesreadily shows the WT-like ‘HF’ motif, blastp searches do not find MBP asa match even when constrained to the human proteome.

We therefore set out to develop an algorithm to use the aggregate datafrom our selection results to inform searches for candidate TCRantigens. First, we created a substitution matrix that would moreaccurately describe the probability of specific amino acid substitutionsimparted by the selecting TCR. We hypothesized we could use thepositional frequency information derived from our Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3deep sequencing data as a pMHC-TCR substitution matrix.

One potential complicating factor in using selection data as asubstitution matrix is that the limited coverage of the libraries atevery position of the peptide could lead to appearance of residue biasesat non-critical (i.e. neutral) peptide positions that do not reflectactual selective pressure. To address this possibility, we created a newHLA-DR15-based library where we fixed the dominant Ob.1A12 binding motif(P2 His, P3 Phe, and P5 Lys/Arg) along with the P1 and P4 MHC-bindinganchors, while the remaining residues were fully randomized. In thisway, all peptides represented in the library contain the main motifrequired for Ob.1A12 binding and we could more accurately measure theoccurrence of substitutions at other sites along the peptide.

When the selected libraries were sequenced, we found no dominantsequence, but rather a broad array of peptides that had enrichedequally. While some proximal positions such as P(−1) and P(−2) stillshowed distinct residue preferences, other positions such as P7 and P8showed less convergence relative to the original HLA-DR15 library. Theseselections provided critical granularity for what amino acids occur awayfrom the TCR-binding ‘hotspot’ on the peptide, allowing us to constructa more reliable algorithm.

We compiled the two 14×20 matrices consisting of the observedfrequencies of the 20 amino acids at each of the 14 positions of thelibrary peptides from the focused DR15 pMHC libraries with the ‘HF’motif selected by Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3 (FIG. 7A). Any amino acid with lessthan 1% prevalence at each position was excluded to minimize possiblenoise from PCR or read errors. Minimal residue covariation was observedfor Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3 selections, so each position was treatedindependently.

With this matrix in hand, we developed a peptide search algorithm. Eachprotein in the NR (NCBI) or human protein (Uniprot) databases wasscanned using a 14 position sliding window and scored as a product ofthe positional substitution matrix (Cockcroft and Osguthorpe, (1991)FEBS letters 293, 149-152). In this way, a candidate peptide containingeven a single disallowed substitution would be excluded as a possiblehit. The search using the Ob.1A12 based matrix yielded 2331 unique NRhits and 13 human peptides, both including MBP. For the search based onthe Ob.2F3 matrix, we had 4825 unique NR hits and 19 unique humanpeptides, again both including MBP. The peptide hits shared the centralP(−1)-P5 motif of MBP but the flanking residues showed very littlesequence homology to either MBP or to each other (FIG. 7B).

The predicted peptides are from diverse microbial sources, such asbacteria; environmental sources, such as antigens expressed by plants;and several peptides derived from proteins in the human proteome. Totest our computationally predicted ligands for Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3, wesynthesized a diverse set comprising 27 of the potential environmentalantigens as well as 6 novel human peptides predicted to cross-react withOb.1A12 and Ob.2F3. The peptides were added to HLADR15 expressingantigen-presenting cells and incubated with the human T cell clones, andT cell proliferation was measured via 3H-thymidine incorporation. Of the33 putative ligands, 26/27 of the environmental antigens and 5/6 of thehuman peptides induced proliferation for Ob.1A12 and/or Ob.2F3, asuccess rate of 94% (FIG. 7B).

The concept of TCR cross-reactivity is important because key aspects ofT cell biology seemingly require recognition of diverse ligands,including thymic development, pathogen surveillance, autoimmunity andtransplant rejection. In this study, we aimed to define the mechanismsunderlying TCR specificity and cross-reactivity using a combinatorial,biochemical approach that yielded massive datasets based on directselection. This has given us insight into the structural basis of TCRcross-reactivity and also provides a robust way to discover new peptides(or the original ligand) for a given TCR.

Our results clarify previous controversies on whether TCRs are highlycross-reactive or highly specific. We find that TCR cross-reactivity canbe explained based on structural principles: peptides possess‘down-facing’ residues that principally fill pockets in the MHC grooveand ‘up-facing’ residues that primarily act to engage the TCR. If thecriterion of crossreactivity is simply the number of unique peptidesequences that can be recognized by any given TCR, then TCRs do exhibita high degree of cross-reactivity. Indeed, our selections are able toidentify hundreds of peptides for each receptor. Given the fact that thelibraries greatly undersample all possible sequence combinations it islikely that our hundreds of discovered peptides are indicative ofthousands of different peptides can be recognized by the studied TCRs.

However, when cross-reactive peptides are examined en masse, we findcentral conserved TCR-binding (i.e. ‘up-facing’) motifs. TCRcross-reactivity is not achieved by each receptor recognizing a largenumber of unrelated peptide epitopes, but rather through greatertolerance for substitutions to peptide residues outside of the TCRinterface, differences in residues that contact the MHC, and relativelyconservative changes to the residues that contact the TCR CDR loops. Thesegregation of TCR recognition and MHC binding allow for TCRs tosimultaneously accommodate needs for specificity and cross-reactivity,ensuring no ‘holes’ in the TCR repertoire without requiring degeneraterecognition of antigen. This conclusion is consistent with previousstudies on human self-reactive TCRs from multiple sclerosis patients:all stimulatory microbial peptides were found to share the primary TCRcontact residues with the MBP self-peptide while substantial changeswere permissible at the MHC interface.

Although this mechanism is general for αβ TCRs, recognition ofnonhomologous antigens can occur to varying degrees in the TCRrepertoire. The ability for one TCR to bind to multiple MHCs (e.g.alloreactivity); for one TCR to bind in multiple orientations on oneMHC; for a peptide to non-canonically bind MHC (e.g. partially-filledpeptide grooves); or for a TCR to have TCR-peptide contacts as adisproportionately large or small part of the overall interface (e.g.‘super-bulged’ peptides) will grant some receptors a greater degree ofepitope promiscuity. Class I and class II MHC specific TCRs may exhibitdifferent degrees of cross-reactivity as a consequence of the ‘lowlying’ peptides in the class II groove, versus the elevated or ‘higherprofile’ peptides presented by class I.

In retrospect, a close inspection reveals striking commonalities in thepeptide binding chemistry by the TCR, in particular a requirement for ahydrophobic contact at the apex of the P7 ‘bulge’ that forms theprincipal site of contact with the TCR CDR3β. In contrast, a secondclass I TCR, 2C, was not found to be cross-reactive, instead exhibitingspecificity for its endogenous antigen, QL9, in a manner similar to theclass II specific TCRs studied here.

An important implication of these findings is that identification ofendogenous antigens of TCRs is feasible using peptide-MHC libraries. Inour previous view of cross-reactivity, we assumed that a given TCR wouldcross-react with so many peptides in a library that elucidation of‘natural’ leads from a background of degenerately binding sequenceswould be extremely difficult. Yet we find that we recover essentiallyonly peptides with clear linkages to the natural ligands. The sparsecoverage of possible sequences renders it unlikely that any givensequence of interest will be represented with 100% identity in ourlibrary.

However, using selection results to constrain computational searches ofprotein databases proved to be a highly successful strategy, with 94% ofpeptides that were predicted to bind showing activity with the TCR ofinterest. Thus, this approach now opens up peptide ligand discovery for‘orphan’ TCRs, such as those from regulatory T cells and tumorinfiltrating lymphocytes (TILs).

While the naturally occurring peptides in this study were found as aproof of principle for our methodology, they demonstrate that autoimmuneT cells have the ability to be activated by immunogens encountered inthe environment, which may serve as the triggers for the initiation ofautoimmunity. Several of the peptides in our panel are derived frommicroorganisms such as Legionella longbeachae and Acinetobacter thathave previously been shown to be pathogenic in humans, and thus may havea role in the pathogenesis of multiple sclerosis. Furthermore, a numberof other peptides from human pathogens were previously shown to activatehuman MBP-specific T cell clones. Additionally, the potential for otherhuman peptides to cross-react with autoimmune TCRs with previously‘known’ antigens presents the intriguing possibility that individualTCRs can recognize multiple self-peptides, potentially contributing to Tcell pathologies in autoimmune disease. This notion is supported by thefinding that a murine TCR specific for myelin-oligodendrocyteglycoprotein cross-reacts with a second CNS antigen, neurofilament M.Due to this unexpected crossreactivity, these T cells remainedpathogenic even in MOG-deficient mice. Our approach for systematicdiscovery of peptides recognized by human TCRs thus can advance ourunderstanding of complex pathogenesis of immune-mediated diseases.

Methods

Creation and staining of yeast display constructs I-Ek and HLA-DR15constructs were codon optimized for yeast expression and synthesized asN-terminal fusions to the yeast surface protein Aga2p (Genscript).Constructs were cloned into the vector pYAL, which contains a Gly-Serlinker and either Myc or Flag epitope tag between the MHC and Aga2p andthe Aga2p leader sequence. MHC α1 and β1 boundaries were determined byexamination of previously published structures (PDB 3QIB and 1YMM) andappropriate MHC linker lengths were determined via modeling in Coot. Forboth constructs, MHC β chain residues 3-96 were used, followed by aneight amino acid Gly-Ser linker, followed by MHC a chain residues 1-83.The peptide was linked to the N terminus of the MHC construct via a 12amino acid linker. MHC constructs were then electroporated into EBY-100yeast as previously described (Adams et al., 2011, supra), and inducedfor expression in SGCAA pH 4.5 media at 20° for 24-60 hours untilmaximum epitope tag staining was observed (typically 40-70% of totalpopulation). To stain pMHC with TCR tetramers, biotinylated TCR wasincubated with streptavidin coupled to AlexaFluor 647 (created asdescribed in Ramachandiran et al. (2007). J Immunol Methods 319, 13-20)in a 5:1 ratio for 5 minutes on ice to ensure complete tetramerformation. Yeast cells were then stained with 500 nMtetramer+anti-Myc-alexa fluor 488 or anti-DYKDDDDK-alexa fluor 488antibodies (Cell Signaling #2279 or #5407, respectively) for 3 hours onice and washed twice with ice cold PBS+0.5% BSA and 1 mM EDTA (PBEbuffer) before analysis via flow cytometry (Accuri C6 flow cytometer).

Library creation of ‘mini’ 1-Ek and HLA-DR15 ‘mini’ MHC constructs weremutagenized via error prone PCR (Genemorph II kit, Agilent 200550), witha final error rate of ˜3-4 nucleotide substitutions per construct asjudged by ligating error prone constructs into a vector and sequencingseveral clones. Yeast libraries were created by electroporation ofcompetent EBY-100 cells via homologous recombination of linearized pYALvector and mutagenized pMHC construct essentially as describedpreviously. Final libraries contained approximately 2×10⁸ yeasttransformants. Peptide libraries were created in the same manner as theerror prone libraries, except pMHC constructs were instead randomizedalong the peptide by using mutagenic primers allowing all 20 amino acidsvia an NNK codon as previously described. The libraries allowed onlylimited diversity at the known MHC anchor residues to maximize thenumber of correctly folded and displayed pMHC clones in the library. ForI-Ek, P1 and P9 anchors were limited to (ILV) and K using VTT and AAAcodons, respectively. P(−2) and P10 were limited to ADNT and AEGKRTusing RMA and RVA codons, respectively. For HLA-DR15, P1 and P4 anchorswere limited to ILV and FY using VTA and TWT codons, respectively. Forthe HFK-suppressed DR-15 library, His was suppressed at P2 by using acombination of DNK and NBK codons; Phe was suppressed at P3 by usingVNK+NVK; Lys was suppressed at P5 by using BNK+NBK, for a total of 8primers to construct the library. The resulting PCR product was used astemplate for a second PCR reaction in which 50 nt of sequence homologousto the vector was added to both ends of the PCR product. ˜100 ug of PCRproduct and ˜20 ug linearized vector were purified and used for thecreation of each library.

List of primers for error prone libraries:

F (gal promoter f): 5′-ATGCAAAAACTGCATAACCAC-3′ R (pyal_rev):5′-GGGATTTGCTCGCATATAGTTG-3′For the random I-Ek library:

F primer (initial randomization PCR):5′-TATTGCTAGCGTTTTAGCAGCTRMTNNKVTTNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAAARVAGGCGGTGGTTCGGGCGGTG-3′ R primer (initial randomization PCR):5′-CGTCATCATCTITATAATCGGATC-3′To add overlap for homologous recombination with linearized pYAL vector:

F primer: 5′-TTCAATTAAGATGCAGTTACTTCGCTGTTTTTCAATATTTTCTGTTATTGCTAGCGTTTTAGCAGCT-3′ R primer:5′-ACCACCAGATCCACCACCACCTTTATCGTCATCATCTTTATAATCGG ATC-3′For the random HLA-DR15 library:

F primer (initial randomization PCR):5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTANNKNNKTWTNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′F primer (to add homologous recombination region):5′-TTCAATTAAGATGCAGTTACTTCGCTGTTTTTCAATATTTTCTGTTA TTGCTAGCGTATTGGCC-3′R primer (used for both PCRs):5′-ACCGCCACCACCAGATCCACCACCACCCAAGTCTTCTTCAGAAATAA GC TT-5′For the ‘HF’ motif suppression library F primers (all other primersidentical to main HLADR15 library, with eight PCR products pooled toserve as second PCR template):

5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTADNKVNKTWTBNKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTADNKVNKTWTNBKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTADNKNVKTWTBNKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTADNKNVKTWTNBKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTANBKVNKTWTBNKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTANBKVNKTWTNBKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTANBKNVKTWTBNKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKVTANBKNVKTWTNBKNNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′For the ‘HF’ motif optimization library F primer (all other primersidentical to main HLADR15 library):

5′-GTTATTGCTAGCGTATTGGCCNNKNNKNNKNNKRTACATTTCTTTARANNKNNKNNKNNKNNKAGAGGTGGTGGTGGTTCAGGT-3′

Selection of pMHC libraries To maximize sensitivity of selections, alldescribed selection steps were conducted at 4° using cold buffers, andrefrigerated centrifuges. All spins were 5,000×g for 1 minute. Beforeeach round of selection, a small sample of yeast (˜1×10⁶ cells) werestained with an anti-epitope tag antibody. For the first round ofselection, ˜2×10⁹ yeast were washed once with PBS+0.5% BSA and 1 mM EDTA(PBE buffer) and then cleared with unloaded Streptavidin Microbeads (250uL beads in 5 mL PBE) (Miltenyi, 130-048-101) to eliminate anynonspecifically binding yeast clones by incubating 1 hr at 4° withgentle rotation. The yeast were then spun down, resuspended in 5 mL PBEwithout a wash, and passed through a Miltenyi LS column. Yeast that didnot bind to streptavidin alone were then spun down, resuspended in 5 mLPBE, and incubated with Streptavidin Microbeads loaded with TCR (400 nMTCR were added to 250 uL beads, an amount empirically determined tosaturate the streptavidin beads) for 3-4 hrs at 4° with gentle rotation.TCR-binding yeast were then selected via an LS column, washed in SDCAA,and then re-cultured in SDCAA, pH 4.5 at 30° C. overnight. Yeast werere-induced upon reaching OD >2. For each round of selection, at least10-fold more yeast was used than recovered from the previous round toensure complete coverage of all selected yeast. Second and third roundsof selection were conducted in the same manner, but with reduced volumes(50 □L of beads in 500 □L PBE). Progress of selections was monitored bycounting of cells selected to TCR-bound streptavidin beads as comparedto streptavidin beads alone via an Accuri C6 flow cytometer. Selectionstypically showed enrichment for TCR binding after 3-4 rounds. For thefinal round of selection (conducted when the yeast count enriched by TCRloaded beads was higher than background, usually after 3 rounds), thelibraries were stained with 500 nM streptavidin-TCR tetramer asdescribed above, washed 3× with PBE, then incubated with 50 uLanti-Alexa647 Microbeads (Miltenyi, 130-091-395) in 450 □ L PBE for 20minutes. The yeast were washed a final time and passed through aMiltenyi LS column. Enriched yeast were then plated on SDCAA plates forcharacterization of individual colonies. Individual yeast clones werethen screened for tetramer staining as described above. Plasmidscontaining the selected pMHC were isolated from positive clones viayeast miniprep (Zymoprep II kit, Zymo Research) and sequenced(Sequetech).

Deep sequencing of selection libraries. Pooled plasmids from 5×10⁷ yeastfrom each round of selection were isolated via yeast miniprep (ZymoprepII kit, Zymo Research) and used as PCR template to prepare Illuminasamples. Amplicon libraries were designed as follows: (IlluminaP5-Truseq read 1-(N8)-Barcode-pMHC-(N8)-Truseq read 2-IlluminaP7). N8was added immediately after both sequencing primers to generatediversity for low complexity sequencing reads. The adapter and barcodesequences were appended via nested 25-round cycles of PCR of thepurified plasmids using Phusion polymerase (NEB). Primers were proximalto the peptide on the pMHC, annealing to the Aga2p leader sequence (5′end) and MHC β1 domain (3′ end) to ensure high quality sequence reads ofthe peptide with double coverage. Final PCR products were run on a highpercentage agarose gel and purified via gel extraction. PCR productswere then quantitated via nanodrop, normalized for each barcoded roundof selection to be equally represented, doped with 5-50% PhiX DNA toensure sufficient sequence diversity for high quality sequence reads,and run on an Illumina MiSeq with 2×150 nt Paired End reads. The initialdeep sequencing run, for the 2B4-I-E^(k) selections, was conducted with1×150 nt Single End reads. When the sequencing data was analyzed asdescribed below, we saw no significant difference in data qualitybetween single and paired-end reads (as judged by comparing the resultsfor 226/5cc7 when analyzed as single reads vs. paired-end reads). Deepsequencing was conducted at the Stanford Stem Cell Institute GenomeCenter.

To analyze the sequence data, contigs were generated for each paired endread using PandaSeq. The contigs were then deconvoluted into individualrounds of selections and trimmed to the peptide sequence using Geneiousversion 6. The number of reads for each unique sequence were then summedand corrected for any potential PCR or sequence read errors bycoalescing any sequences differing from only 1 nucleotide from the mostdominant representative sequence. Sequences were then translated intopeptides, and any reads that contained stop codons or frameshifts wereomitted from further analysis. Amino acid frequencies and coevolutionanalyses were then calculated using scripts and visualized with Matlab(Mathworks Inc.) as previously described.

List of primers used for deep sequencing. The first PCR was conductedwith primers specific to the MHC construct that added N8 sequence forread diversity and a 6-nucleotide barcode. The second PCR was conductedwith general primers to add the necessarily Illumina adaptor sequences.

I-E^(k) F primer: 5′-CTA CAC GAC GCT CTT CCG ATC TNN NNN NNN XXX XXX CTGTTA TTG CTA GCG TTT TAG CA-3′ I-E^(k) R primer: 5′-GCT GAA CCG CTC TTCCGA TCT NNN NNN NNA ACT CTT TGA GTA CCA TTA TAG AAA-3′ HLA-DR15 Fprimer: 5′-CTA CAC GAC GCT CTT CCG ATC TNN NNN NNN XXX XXX CTG TTA TTGCTA GCG TAT TGG CC-3′ HLA-DR15 R primer: 5′-GCT GAA CCG CTC TTC CGA TCTNNN NNN NNC GTT GAA AAA GTG ACA TTC TC-3′ Illumina F: 5′-AAT GAT ACG GCGACC ACC GAG ATC TAC ACT CTT TCC CTA CAC GAC GCT CTT CCG ATC T-3′Illumina R: 5′-CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA GAT CGG TCT CGG CAT TCC TGCTGA ACC GCT CTT CCG ATC-3′, Where XXX XXX represents the followingbarcodes:

I-E^(k) round DNA barcode HLA-DR15 Round DNA barcode I-E^(k) pre- ATCACGHLA-DR15 random lib GTGGCC selection lib pre-selection 2B4 rd1 CGATGTRandom lib Ob.1A12 rd1 GTTTCG 2B4 rd2 TTAGGC Random lib Ob.1A12 rd2CGTACG 2B4 rd3 TGACCA Random lib Ob.1A12 rd3 GAGTGG 2B4 rd4 ACAGTGRandom lib Ob.1A12 rd4 GGTAGC I-E^(k) pre- GGCTAC Random lib Ob.2F3 rd1ATGAGC selection lib 5cc7 rd1 CTTGTA Random lib Ob.2F3 rd2 ATTCCT5cc7 rd2 AGTCAA Random lib Ob.2F3 rd3 CAAAAG 5cc7 rd3 AGTTCCRandom lib Ob.2F3 rd4 CAACTA 5cc7 rd4 ATGTCA HLA-DR15 HF-sappressedCACGAT lib pre-selection 226 rd1 CCGTCC HF suppressed Ob.1A12 CACTCA rd1226 rd2 GTAGAG HF suppressed Ob.1A12 CAGGCG rd2 226 rd3 GTCCGCHF suppressed Ob.1A12 CATGGC rd3 226 rd4 GTGAAA HF suppressed Ob.1A12CATTTT rd4 HF suppressed Ob.2F3 rd1 CGGAAT HF suppressed Ob.2F3 rd2CTAGCT HF suppressed Ob.2F3 rd3 CTATAC HF suppressed Ob.2F3 rd4 CTCAGAHLA-DR15 HF-motif lib TACAGC pre-selectron HF motif Ob.1A12 rd1 TATAATHF motif Ob.1A12 rd2 TCATTC HF motif Ob.1A12 rd3 TCCCGAHF motif Ob.2F3 rd1 TCGAAG HF motif Ob.2F3 rd2 TCGGCAHF motif Ob.2F3 rd3 AAACAC

Clustering of selected peptide sequences. To quantify peptideconvergence, a random sampling of 1000 pre-enriched library sequenceswere compared to the top 1000 most enriched sequences from each of thepost-TCR selection library sequences. For each set, dispersion wasquantified as the minimum hamming distance from each sequence to thenext closest non-identical sequence within the set. While in thepreselected library the mean minimum distance was 5 amino acids and noidentical or distance 1 amino acid sequences were observed, in each ofthe selected libraries the majority of sequences were significantly moresimilar to one another than observed pre-selection, with a significantenrichment of distance 1 (p<0.001), distance 2 (p<0.001) and distance 3(p<0.001) sequences emerging after selection, as determined by bothChi-squared and permutation sampling studies from the preselectedlibrary. To distinguish whether TCR selection resulted in a singleconvergent peptide solution or multiple independent solutions, for eachTCR selection all sequences enriched to a frequency above the highestfrequency for any clone in the background library were combined andconnected by hamming distance into a network using the maximum mutationdistance parameter 1, 2, 3, or 4 as obtained from initial sampling. Thenetworks established that all sequences from all three TCRs generate asingle dominant graph in which the true ligand was also connected(although never explicitly discovered), while no unselected librarysequences converged into the network.

Profile-based searches for naturally occurring peptide ligands basedupon selection results. The positional frequencies from the round 3fixed HF library were used to generate a 14×20 matrix. The positionalfrequencies for the P1 and P4 anchors from the most abundant uniquesequences from the selected fully random library was used instead of thefixed HF library frequencies to increase diversity of sequences in thesearch at the respective positions. A cutoff of amino acid frequenciesless than 0.01 was used and frequencies below the cutoff were set tozero. The NCBI NR database and Human proteome from Uniprot were bothdownloaded from the respective servers. Both the NR and human databaseswere searched with the custom algorithm by using a 14-position slidingwindow alignment with scoring the product of positional amino acidfrequencies from the substitution matrix (Cockcroft and Osguthorpe(1991) FEBS letters 293, 149-152; De la Herran-Arita et al. (2013)Science translational medicine 5, 216ra176.). An aligned segmentcontaining at least one amino acid where the frequency was below the0.01 frequency cutoff was excluded as a match regardless of theabundance at other positions. Since the search found thousands ofpossible unique 14 amino acid peptide matches and the success rate forthe functional activation potential of the predicted peptides wasunknown, we aligned each of the fixed-HF library peptides with >20 readsto each of the peptide database hits. 26 NR hits and library comparatorshits plus 8 human peptide hits (including the WT peptide, MBP) werechosen for functional validation. The peptides were chosen to havediverse statistics such as pairwise identity between search hit andlibrary comparator sequence, search score, counts of the librarycomparator peptides, and diversity of sequence identity. Broad diversityof statistics was considered to sample the parameters for the hundredsof predicted peptides, the logic was to later use this information toimprove our predictions. However, due to the high prediction rate, 94%,no correlations could be made.

Protein expression of pMHC and TCR for selection, affinity measurements,and structure determination. Proteins for this study were created inmultiple formats, described below and separated by use.

2B4, 226, and 5cc7 TCR for selection. TCR VmCh chimeras containing anengineered C domain disulfide were cloned into the pAcGP67a insectexpression vector (BD Biosciences, 554756) encoding either a C-terminalacidic GCN4-zipper-Biotin acceptor peptide (BAP)-6×His tag (for a chain)or a C-terminal basic GCN4 zipper-6×His tag (for β chain). Each chainalso encoded a 3C protease site between the C-terminus of the TCRectodomains and the GCN4 zippers to allow for cleavage of zippers.Baculoviruses for each TCR construct were created in SF9 cells viacontransfection of BD baculogold linearized baculovirus DNA (BDBiosciences 554739) with Cellfectin II (Life Technologies 10362-100).TCRα and β chain viruses were coinfected in a small volume (2 mL) ofHigh Five cells in various ratios to find a ratio to ensure 1:1 α:βstoichiometry.

To prepare TCRs, 1 L of High Five cells were infected with theappropriate ratio of TCRα and TCRβ viruses for 48 hrs at 28°. Collectedculture media was conditioned with 100 mM Tris-HCl pH8.0, 1 mM NiCl2, 5mM CaCl₂) and the subsequent precipitation was cleared viacentrifugation. The media is then incubated with Ni-NTA resin (Qiagen30250) at RT for 3 hours and eluted in 1×HBS+200 mM imidazole pH 7.2.TCRs were then site-specifically biotinylated by adding recombinant BirAligase, 100 μM biotin, 50 mM Bicine pH 8.3, 10 mM ATP, and 10 mMMagnesium Acetate and incubating 4° 0/N. The reaction was then purifiedvia size exclusion chromatography using an AKTAPurifier (GE Healthcare)on a Superdex 200 column (GE Healthcare). Peak fractions were pooled andthen tested for biotinylation using an SDS-PAGE gel shift assay.Proteins were typically 100% biotinylated.

Insect-expressed 2B4 TCR for crystallography. 2B4 TCR was created asdescribed above, except instead of biotinylation, protein was incubatedwith recombinant 3C protease (10 μg/mg of TCR) and carboxypeptidase A at4° overnight. Insect-expressed I-E^(k) MHC I-E^(k) was cloned intopAcGP67A with acidic/basic zippers as described for TCRs. The I-E^(k)βconstruct was modified with an N-terminal extension containing eitherthe 2A peptide via a Gly-Ser linker or CLIP peptide via a Gly-Ser linkercontaining a thrombin cleavage site.

Expression, biotinylation, and purification of protein were as describedfor insect-expressed TCRs, with the exception of 72 hours of proteinexpression. For crystallography, I-Ek was treated with recombinant 3Cprotease (10 μg/mg of MHC) and carboxypeptidase A and incubated at 4°overnight before size exclusion chromatography.

Refolded Murine TCRs for crystallography and affinity measurements.Refolded 2B4, 226, and 5cc7 were created essentially as described. For5c1 and 5c2 crystal structures, the 5c1 and 5c2 peptides were fused tothe N-terminus of 5cc7β via a 10-amino acid GlySer linker. TCRs werepurified via size exclusion chromatography and assayed via SDS-PAGE toensure 1:1 α:β stoichiometry. If there were an excess of TCRβ, ββhomodimer was purified away from αβ heterodimer via ion exchangechromatography on a MonoQ column (GE Healthcare) using a 20 mM Tris pH8/20 mM Tris pH8+500 mM NaCl buffer system. Proteins were thenreexchanged into HBS for further use.

Refolding and biotinylation of Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3 TCRs. The a and βchains of Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3 TCRs were separately cloned into thepET-22b vector (Novagen) and expressed as inclusion bodies in BL21(DE3)Escherichia coli cells (Novagen). The inclusion bodies were purified anddissolved in 6 M guanidine hydrochloride, 10 mM dithiothreitol and 10 mMEDTA. To initiate refolding, solubilized TCR α and β chains were mixedat a 1:1 molar ratio and diluted to a final concentration of 25 μg/ml ofeach chain in a refolding buffer containing 5 M urea, 0.5 ML-arginine-HCl, 100 mM Tris-HCl, pH 8.2, 1 mM GSH and 0.1 mM GSSH. After40 h at 4° C., the refolding mixture was dialyzed twice againstdeionized water and twice against 10 mM Tris-HCl, pH 8.0. Refolded TCRwas purified by anion exchange chromatography using Poros PI (AppliedBiosystems) and MonoQ (GE Healthcare) columns. Two cysteines that formthe interchain disulfide bond of the Cα and Cβ Ig domains wererepositioned from the C-terminal to the N-terminal part of these domains(via replacement of Cα Thr48 and Cβ Ser57 with cysteines) in order toenhance refolding of TCR heterodimer (Boulter et al., 2003). In theexpression construct, a BirA tag was placed at the C-terminal of the TCRβ chain. Site-specific biotinylation of the BirA tag was carried out ata protein concentration of 2 mg/ml at a molar ratio of 20:1 (TCR toBirA). Reactions were incubated for 2 h at 30° C. in the presence of 100μM biotin, 10 mM ATP, 10 mM magnesium acetate and protease inhibitors,followed by extensive dialysis to remove excess biotin. Biotinylationwas confirmed by mobility shift with streptavidin using nativepolyacrylamide gels.

Selection of library derived I-Ek peptides for further characterization.Peptides were chosen from the deep sequencing data across a wide rangeof sequence prevalence for further study via SPR, activity, andstructural characterization. Peptides were chosen that were recognizedby 1, 2, or all 3 I-E^(k) reactive TCRs. All peptides were tested foractivity with both 2B4 and 5cc7 T cell clones regardless of for whichTCR they were initially selected. A subset of peptides was chosen tofurther characterize via SPR. The 2A peptide that was structurallycharacterized in FIG. 5A was discovered by manual curation of an I-Ekpeptide library. 2A is highly homologous to peptides represented in thedeep sequencing data and co-clusters with MCC.

Surface plasmon resonance. Affinity measurements for peptides bound toI-Ek for 226, 2B4, and 5cc7 TCRs were determined via surface plasmonresonance on a Biacore T100 (GE Healthcare). 10 μM of peptide ofinterest was added to biotinylated Clip-1-Ek. 1 U thrombin/100 μg MHCwas added and incubated at 37°. After 1 hour, pH was lowered by addingsodium cacodylate pH 6.2 to 30 mM and sample was incubated at 37°overnight. Samples were then neutralized with 40 mM HEPES pH 7.2 andstored at 4° until use. pMHC exchanged with the peptide of interest werebound to a Biacore SA chip (GE Healthcare) at a low surface density(100-200 RU) to ensure no recapture of analyte. I-Ek exchanged with anull peptide (MCC K99E) was used as the reference surface. SPR runs wereconducted in HBSP+ with 0.1% BSA to reduce nonspecific binding of TCR tothe dextran surface. All measurements were made with 3-fold serialdilutions of refolded TCR using 60s association followed by a 600 sdissociation at 10-30 μL/min flow rate. No regeneration was requiredbecause samples returned completely to baseline during dissociation.Measurement of titrations at equilibrium was used to determine KD.

Activity assay for I-Ek-selected peptides. Lymphocytes were isolatedfrom 5cc7 or 2B4 TCR transgenic Rag−/− mice. All cells were maintainedin RPMI+10% FBS, 2 mM L-glutamine, 1 mM sodium pyruvate, 1×MEM-NEAA,pen-strep, and 50 μM 2-mercaptoethanol. Antigen specific T cells werestimulated to form blasts with 10 μM MCC added to cells at 1×107cells/mL, with 30 U/mL recombinant IL-2 (R&D Systems) added on day 0 andday 1, splitting on subsequent days as necessary. T cell blasts wereused between day 6 and day 10 post-stimulation and isolated withHistopaque 1119 (Sigma) before use to ensure live lymphocytes. T cellswere placed into fresh media for 6 hours pre-stimulation to ensure cellswere at rest before introduction of peptides of interest. Peptides fromlibrary plus positive (MCC) and negative (MCC K99E) controls weresynthesized via solid phase peptide synthesis (Genscript) and dissolvedat 20 mM in DMSO. 1×10⁵ CH27 cells (an APC line that expresses I-E^(k))per titration point were incubated with peptide diluted in RPMI(Invitrogen) at 37° for 8 hours in a 96 well plate to allow peptideloading. 5×10⁴ T cell blasts were then added to each well and the platewas briefly pulsed in a swinging bucket centrifuge to ensure good Tcell—APC contact. The T cells were stimulated for 18 hours at 37°+5% CO2in an incubator. After stimulation, cells were pelleted (300×g 5minutes). The conditioned media was collected and frozen to measure IL-2release and the cells were used to measure CD69 upregulation. To measureCD69 upregulation, T cells were stained with anti CD69-PE (clone H1.2F3,eBioscience 12-0691) and anti CD4-APC (clone GK1.5, eBioscience 17-0041)for 20 minutes at 4°. Cells were then washed in PBS+0.5% BSA and fixedwith 1.6% paraformaldehyde in PBS for 15 minutes at room temperature,and washed one final time before analysis. CD69 upregulation wasmeasured using an Accuri C6 flow cytometer with an autosampler (BD) bymeasuring CD69 MFI in the CD4+ gate. Data was then normalized and EC50smeasured via Prism. IL-2 release was measured in technical triplicatesvia anti-IL-2 Elisa (Ready-setgo mouse IL-2 ELISA kit, eBioscience88-7024), as recommended by the manufacturer. Media was diluted 1:50 inbuffer to obtain measurement within dynamic range of ELISA. Absorbancewas measured via SpectraMax Paradigm (Molecular Devices), with EC50determined via Graphpad Prism.

T cell Proliferation assays Ob.1A12 and Ob.2F3 T cell clones wererestimulated with PHA-L (Roche) in the presence of irradiated peripheralblood mononuclear cells and cultured in RPMI 1640 supplemented with 10%FBS, 2 mM GlutaMAX-I, 10 mM Hepes (all Invitrogen), 1% human serum(Valley Biochemical), and 5 U/ml rIL-2 (Roche), as previously described(Wucherpfennig et al., 1994). T cells were used between 10 and 14 daysafter restimulation. To determine proliferation, 50×10³ Ob.1A12 orOb.2F3 T cells were cocultured in a 1:1 ratio with irradiatedEBV-transformed MGAR cells that had been treated with 50 μg/ml mitomycinC for 30 min at 37° C. Cells were plated in 0.2 ml/well of a 96-wellround bottom plate in AIM-V media (Invitrogen) supplemented with 2 mMGlutaMAX-I. Peptides were tested over a range of concentrations (intriplicates) and proliferation was assessed by [³H]-thymidineincorporation after 72 h of culture.

Crystallization and X-ray data collection of I-Ek-TCR complexes. For the2A-I-E^(k)-2B4 complex, 2B4 and 2A-I-E^(k) were expressed and purifiedseparately, as described above, and then mixed at a 1:1 ratio andconcentrated to 14 mg/ml. Crystals formed in 100 nl sitting drops in 20mM sodium/potassium phosphate, 0.1 M Bis-Tris propane pH8.5, 20%PEG-3350. For the 5c1/5c2-I-E^(k)-5cc7 complexes, tethered pMHC-TCRcomplexes were produced essentially as described in Newell et al, 2011.Briefly, purified CLIP-I-E^(k) and 5cc7 with peptide tethered to theN-terminus of TCR were mixed at a 1:3 ratio and concentrated to 4 mg/mL.1 U thrombin per 100 □g CLIP-I-E^(k), and carboxypeptidases A and B wereincubated with this sample for 3 hours at room temperature (RT). Sodiumcacodylate, pH 6.2 was added to a final concentration of 30 mM andincubated at RT for 24-48 hours. Complex was isolated via size exclusionchromatography and concentrated to 10-15 mg/ml. Crystals formed in 100nl-sitting drops in 0.2 M potassium citrate, 18% PEG-3350. Crystals usedto collect datasets included either 4% 1,3 butanediol (for 5c1) or 4%Tert-butanol (for 5c2). All crystals were flash frozen in liquidnitrogen in mother liquor+30% ethylene glycol, and datasets werecollected at Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (Stanford,Calif.) beamlines 11-1 and 12-2. Data were indexed, integrated, andscaled using either XDS/XSCALE or the HKL-2000 program suite.

Structure determination and refinement. All structures were solved viamolecular replacement using the program Phaser. The molecularreplacement search model for the TCRs was the unliganded 2B4 or 5cc7 TCR(PDB ID 3QJF and 3QJH), with the CDR3 loops deleted to avoid model bias.The molecular replacement search model for MHC was the pMHC from theMCC-1-E^(k)-2B4 complex structure (PDB ID 3QIB) with the peptide deletedto avoid model bias. Manual model building of the peptide and CDR3 loopswas performed in COOT followed by iterative rounds of refinement withPhenix, using NCS restraints for the 5cc7 complex structures. For the5cc7 complex structures, the first complex copy in the asymmetric unit(chains A-E) was used for analysis. Figures were made with PYMOL.

TABLE 1 2B4-2A-I-E^(k) 5cc7-5c1-I-E^(k) 5cc7-5c2-I-E^(k) Data CollectionSpace Group C2 C2 C2 Cell Dimensions a, b, c (Å) 239.94, 60.18, 78.36261.60, 101.87, 214.64 262.90, 102.21, 214.11 α, β, γ (°) 90, 104.33, 9090, 94.88, 90 90, 95.04, 90 Resolution (Å) 50-2.60 (2.64-2.60)39.81-3.29 (3.36-3.29) 39.63-3.30 (3.36-3.30) R_(sym) (%) 9.3 (42.8)14.3 (135.6) 17.7 (198.0) <I/σ(I)> 13.6 (2.0) 10.9 (1.3) 9.3 (1.0)Completeness (%) 96.8 (88.6) 98.8 (84.9) 99.3 (96.5) Redundancy 3.8(2.8) 6.8 (5.8) 7.1 (6.7) Refinement Resolution (Å) 50-2.60 (2.68-2.60)40-3.29 (3.33-3.29) 40-3.30 (3.34-3.30) Reflections 32548 84239 84648R_(cryst) (%) 18.87 (28.13) 21.07 (35.82) 18.81 (36.77) R_(free) (%)24.50 (36.43) 24.10 (40.73) 23.57 (40.12) Number of atoms Protein 649325581 25597 Ligand 90 70 70 Water 118 0 0 Wilson B-factor 47.84 99.48102.14 Average B-factors (Å²) All 57.10 119.20 124.70 Protein 57.26119.20 124.70 Solvent 48.36 — — R.m.s. deviations from ideality BondLengths (Å) 0.003 0.008 0.005 Bond Angles (°) 0.695 0.831 0.888Ramachandran statistics Favored (%) 96.49 96.37 95.80 Outliers (%) 0 0 0Rotamer outliers (%) 0.70 0.54 0.75 Clashscore 4.76 4.98 5.40 PDBaccession code 4P2O 4P2R 4P2Q

TABLE 2 Ob. 1A12 TCR Peptide Position −4 −3 −2 −1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10Amino A 0.06 0.11 0.15 0.05 0 0 0 0 0 0.23 0.03 0.07 0.12 0.1 Acid C0.02 0.03 0.02 0.04 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.01 0.01 0.11 0.02 D 0.06 0.01 0 0 0 00 0 0 0.02 0 0.02 0 0.02 E 0.13 0.05 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.05 0.04 0 0.02 F0.02 0.01 0 0 0.01 0 1 0.46 0 0 0.02 0 0 0.03 G 0.06 0.1 0.15 0 0 0 0 00 0.23 0.02 0.06 0.05 0.03 H 0.11 0.1 0.07 0.02 0 1 0 0 0 0 0.14 0.05 00.03 I 0.01 0.01 0 0 0.45 0 0 0.02 0 0 0.04 0.02 0.05 0.02 K 0.02 0.050.02 0.22 0 0 0 0 0.74 0 0 0.04 0 0.05 L 0.03 0.05 0 0 0.19 0 0 0.1 0 00.17 0.1 0.23 0.08 M 0.03 0.02 0 0.01 0.03 0 0 0.02 0 0.06 0.02 0.040.03 0.04 N 0.04 0.04 0.06 0.07 0 0 0 0 0 0.17 0.08 0.02 0 0.02 P 0 0.030.16 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.1 0.11 0 0.03 Q 0.07 0.06 0.09 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.040.07 0.05 0.01 0.03 R 0.07 0.12 0.11 0.25 0 0 0 0 0.26 0 0.08 0.12 00.16 S 0.11 0.08 0.14 0.08 0 0 0 0 0 0.17 0.04 0.09 0.04 0.09 T 0.060.07 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.06 0.02 0.06 0.04 0.05 V 0.03 0.04 0.02 0.24 0.29 00 0.02 0 0 0.04 0.07 0.26 0.1 W 0.02 0 0 0 0.01 0 0 0.08 0 0 0.05 0 00.05 Y 0.04 0.02 0 0 0.01 0 0 0.3 0 0 0.01 0.01 0 0.03 Ob.2F3 TCRPeptide Position −4 −3 −2 −1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Amino A 0.07 0.1 0.160.08 0 0 0 0 0 0.26 0.02 0.07 0.1 0.1 Acid C 0.02 0.03 0.02 0.04 0 0 0 00 0.01 0.01 0.01 0.08 0.03 D 0.06 0.02 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.01 0.01 0.02 00.02 E 0.12 0.06 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.07 0.04 0 0.02 F 0.02 0.01 0 0 0.01 01 0.46 0 0 0.01 0.01 0 0.03 G 0.06 0.1 0.15 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.23 0.02 0.060.04 0.03 H 0.08 0.08 0.06 0.03 0 1 0 0 0 0 0.04 0.05 0.01 0.03 I 0.010.01 0 0.01 0.45 0 0 0.02 0 0 0.04 0.02 0.07 0.02 K 0.02 0.05 0.02 0.150 0 0 0 0.69 0 0 0.04 0 0.04 L 0.03 0.04 0.01 0 0.19 0 0 0.1 0 0 0.170.11 0.26 0.08 M 0.03 0.02 0.01 0.01 0.03 0 0 0.02 0 0.03 0.01 0.04 0.040.04 N 0.04 0.04 0.06 0.08 0 0 0 0 0 0.15 0.11 0.02 0.01 0.02 P 0 0.040.12 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.09 0.09 0 0.03 Q 0.08 0.07 0.07 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.030.13 0.05 0.02 0.03 R 0.07 0.13 0.12 0.21 0 0 0 0 0.31 0 0.12 0.12 00.13 S 0.11 0.08 0.15 0.11 0 0 0 0 0 0.18 0.03 0.09 0.03 0.1 T 0.06 0.070 0.01 0 0 0 0 0 0.05 0.06 0.08 0.04 0.08 V 0.04 0.04 0.02 0.26 0.29 0 00.02 0 0 0.04 0.07 0.3 0.11 W 0.02 0 0 0 0.01 0 0 0.08 0 0 0.01 0.01 00.05 Y 0.04 0.02 0 0.01 0.01 0 0 0.3 0 0 0.01 0.02 0 0.03

Example 2

A library for the HLA protein B5703 was generated with the peptideligand as shown in FIG. 16. The library was expressed and screened asdescribed above in Example 1, with the AGA1 T cell receptor. After 3rounds of selection, a heatmap of the search matrix from high throughputsequencing was generated, shown in FIG. 17.

The top 20 peptides after round 3 has the sequences shown below in Table3. The number of times the peptides were represented after selection isshown in each column.

Library Peptide Naïve Rd1 Rd2 Rd3 Rd4 NSLKPEIPDYF 11 47 48656 268475171826 GTIRPEIREMW 5 37 36754 226381 113394 SSGVPEVRMMF 6 38 40422215079 125041 LSLRPEIPLFF 5 74 63749 183724 189891 KSFVPELKPAF 2 3637327 157329 120443 WTYRPEVRGVW 4 21 30482 128915 91015 RSFYPEIREYW 7 1914782 119258 48648 SSFSPELRMRW 3 10 14335 98338 48729 KSCTPEVREYF 0 1715114 94896 49796 ASFSPELRMAW 0 10 9925 47218 31919 KSLAPEVRDLF 0 8 650234865 22054 NSVKPEIRPVW 6 10 10086 33679 32818 NSFRPEVAMKY 6 7 601331331 19786 KSLTPEVRGYW 1 15 13273 30634 38231 YSFKPELKEIF 0 5 564828641 20312 ASFRPELAEFW 1 11 14699 24829 42208 GSLAPEIRMYW 9 11 310823178 10848 RSFVPEIGMGF 8 18 20370 22329 65722 SALRPEIRLLW 1 50 2884021235 70740The data was input into a search algorithm and used to define databasehits of potential epitopes for the T cell receptor, shown in Table 4 andTable 5 below: TABLE 4 GAG hits

JMBlast GI number Reference Score NR Peptide Annotations 255986448AOU50607.1 8.71E−10 KAFSPEVXXMF 278. gag protein [Humanimmunodeficiency virus 1] 9651280 AAF91122.1 2.00E−09 RAFSPEVLPMF  9. gag protein, partial [Human immunodeficiency virus 1] 119361821ABL66844.1 2.90E−09 KAFSPEVLPMF  91. gag protein [Humanimmunodeficiency virus 1] 166917908 ABZ03807.1 2.90E−09 KAFSPEVGPMF190. gag protein, partial [Human immunodeficiency virus 1] 45644268AAS72819.1 8.71E−09 KAFSPEVXPMF  41. gag protein, partial [Humanimmunodeficiency virus 1] 269308083 ACZ34129.1 2.90E−08 KAFSPEVKPMF296. gag protein, partial [Human immunodeficiency virus 1]

TABLE 5 Top 20 NR database hits % ID to Closest % ID to KF11 LibraryLibrary GI number GAG NR Peptide Hit (>60%) Peptide 302335486 35.7RSLAPEVRGYW KSLTPEVRGYW 81.8 345792467 42.9 WTSSPEIRAVF WTSHPEIRAYF 81.8495145889 28.6 ASSRPELALAY ASFRPELALRY 81.8 459942335 35.7 WTSHPEIKAAFWTSHPEIRAYF 81.8 430749919 42.9 RSLKPEVREVF KSLTPEVREYF 72.7 49471608342.9 ASLRPEVREAF KSLAPEVRELF 72.7 493030958 42.9 KSLYPEIREVF RSFYPEIREYF72.7 497464005 28.6 LSGVPEIRERW LSLRPEIREYW 72.7 497193348 35.7LTIRPEIRPRW GTIRPEIREMW 72.7 488856804 42.9 ASFKPELPDFF NSFKPEIPDYF 72.7430004692 35.7 STISPEIRLFW GTISPEIREMW 72.7 471573742 42.9 ASLKPEVPLVFLSLRPEVPLFF 72.7 495156089 42.9 SSGAPEVRELF SSGVPEVRMMF 72.7 30109277235.7 SSVVPELPMAF SSVVPEVRMMF 72.7 348664816 42.9 RSFYPELRLLF RSFYPEIREYF72.7 497177556 50.0 LTISPEIPPYF GTIRPEIPDYF 72.7 497797312 42.9ESFRPEIRQYF RSFYPEIREYF 72.7 448510490 50.0 GSLSPELRPIF LSGSPELRMIF 72.715790131 35.7 STLSPELRGRW SSFSPELRMRW 72.7 313682157 42.9 KSFRPELKEFYASFRPELAEFW 72.7

1.-27. (canceled)
 28. A method of creating a cell library of diversecandidate peptide ligands of a T-cell receptor (TCR), the methodcomprising: providing a population of host cells; introducing into thehost cells nucleic acids encoding polypeptides comprising the diversecandidate peptide ligands; wherein the polypeptides are configured to bedisplayed on a surface of the host cells; and allowing the host cells toexpress and display the diverse candidate peptide ligands on the surfaceof the host cells.
 29. The method of claim 28, wherein the polypeptidesare single chain polypeptides each comprising (a) a peptide ligand and(b) a binding domain of an MHC protein.
 30. The method of claim 29,wherein the single chain polypeptides each have a structure ofP-L₁-β-L₂-α-L₃-T, wherein P is the peptide ligand; each of L₁, L₂ and L₃are flexible linkers of from about 4 to about 12 amino acids in length;α is a soluble form of an α domain of a human class I MHC protein or ofa human class II MHC protein; β is a soluble form of human class I MHCβ2 microglobulin or a soluble form of a β domain of a human class II MHCβ protein; when a is the soluble form of an α domain of a human class IMHC protein, then β is the soluble form of human class I MHC β2microglobulin; when α is the soluble form of an α domain of a humanclass II MHC protein, then β is the soluble form of a β domain of ahuman class II MHC β protein; and T is a domain that tethers the singlechain polypeptide to the surface of a host cell in the population ofhost cells.
 31. The method of claim 29, wherein the MHC binding domaincomprises α1 and α2 domains of a class I MHC α protein, and β2microglobulin.
 32. The method of claim 29, wherein the MHC bindingdomain comprises α1 and β1 domains of a class II MHC protein.
 33. Themethod of claim 32, wherein the binding domain is encoded by an alleleof HLA-DRA and an allele of HLA-DRB4.
 34. The method of claim 32,wherein the binding domain is encoded by an allele of HLA-DRA and anallele of HLA-DRB15.
 35. The method of claim 28, further comprisingmutagenizing the nucleic acids using error-prone PCR.
 36. The method ofclaim 29, wherein the peptide ligand is from about 8 to about 20 aminoacids in length.
 37. The method of claim 28, further comprisingmutagenizing the nucleic acids along the candidate peptide ligands usingmutagenic primers.
 38. The method of claim 29, wherein the peptideligand is randomized at multiple positions, and wherein the peptideligand has limited diversity at MHC anchor positions.
 39. The method ofclaim 28, wherein the cell library is created in the cells usinghomologous recombination.
 40. The method of claim 29, wherein the celllibrary comprises at least 10⁶ diverse single chain polypeptides. 41.The method of claim 28, wherein the host cells are yeast cells.
 42. Themethod of claim 29, wherein the host cells are yeast cells.
 43. Themethod of claim 42, wherein the T is Aga2.
 44. The method of claim 29,wherein the flexible linkers are Gly-Ser linkers.
 45. The method ofclaim 28, wherein the polypeptides are single chain polypeptides eachcomprising (a) a peptide ligand and (b) a binding domain of an MHCprotein; and the peptide ligand is from about 8 to about 20 amino acidsin length and is randomized at multiple positions and has limiteddiversity at MHC anchor positions.
 46. The method of claim 29, whereinthe peptide ligand is from about 8 to about 20 amino acids in length andis randomized at multiple positions and has limited diversity at MHCanchor positions; the α is the soluble form of an α domain of a humanclass I MHC protein comprising α1 and α2 domains of the human class IMHC protein; the β is the soluble form of the human class I MHC β2microglobulin; the T is Aga2; and the host cells are yeast cells. 47.The method of claim 29, wherein the peptide ligand is from about 8 toabout 20 amino acids in length and is randomized at multiple positionsand has limited diversity at MHC anchor positions; the α is the solubleform of an α domain of a human class II MHC protein; the β is a solubleform of the human class II MHC β protein; the T is Aga2; and the hostcells are yeast cells.